Planning Meeting Discussion Strategy: Explanation
This activity gives learners an opportunity to discuss the various ways a piece of work might be approached, prior to them getting underway with the task.
It is a good way to help learners think critically about how they are going to do something. It prioritises the planning phase, encouraging learners to think about the different options that are open to them
The teacher sets learners an extended piece of work to complete, based on what they have been studying over a series of lessons.
Learners are divided into groups of four.
Each group is given a sheet of sugar paper and some felt-tip pens.
They are invited to begin by creating a spider diagram detailing as many different approaches to the work as possible.
Having done this, groups identify which of the approaches they feel are likely to be the most successful and debate the strengths and weaknesses of each of these in turn.
At this point, learners are asked to work individually to plan out the approach they will personally take.
They are given between five and ten minutes.
Once this has been done, they return to their groups and take it in turns to explain to their colleagues how they foresee themselves completing the task.
Each approach is discussed; strengths are identified and suggestions made as to possible improvements.
Finally, learners go off and complete their work, using their modified plans as a guide.
It is expected that, by working through the planning stage in detail and by being exposed to a range of viewpoints and ideas, the work learners produce will be more refined than it otherwise might have been, and of a higher standard.
Planning Meeting Discussion Strategy: Example
Topic: The Aftermath of World War One
The teacher sets learners the following task:
- Create a report explaining how people in France, Germany and Britain were affected by the decisions made at the end of World War One.
Learners are divided into groups and invited to discuss ways in which you could approach the task.
In the first stage, the emphasis is on generating ideas.
In this case, a group’s spider diagram might include things like:
- Focus on each country in turn.
- Look at each major decision in turn and trace how it affected people in each country.
- Take certain groups common to each country (the working-class and politicians, for example) and trace how the decisions affected them.
- Compare the different effects certain decisions had on people living in each of the three countries.
- Look at the short-term, medium-term and long-term consequences of the decisions.
Many more suggestions could be added.
The purpose is simply to demonstrate how one task can invite several different approaches, all of which are worth investigating and all of which may allow learners to produce excellent work.
If you are concerned about whether learners can generate a wide range of ideas, scaffold the task by displaying two or three ideas on the board as examples.
Alternatively, begin with a whole-class discussion that draws a few ideas into the open.
Identifying the strongest ideas and then using discussion to analyse these helps learners think carefully about what each might mean for the report the teacher has asked them to create.
The act of discussion is itself a means of planning.
It gives learners the chance to pick apart the various ideas and to consider how each could be effectively put into practice.
Planning Meeting Discussion Strategy: Extensions and Developments
- When learners have completed their work, ask them to re-form the original groups they were in and to share what they have done with their peers. A discussion should then ensue in which the final pieces of work are compared to the plans that learners outlined earlier.
- Evaluation tables can be used as an aid to analysis. These are written tables with two columns: one for strengths and one for weaknesses. Groups can create one of these for each of the approaches they identify as being particularly strong. Individuals can then use these to help in deciding which approach to follow through with.
