Activities & Guides
- Fostering Civil Discourse: A Guide for Classroom TeachersA guidebook and activities from Facing History & Ourselves.
- Transforming Conflict on College CampusesA guidebook from the Construction Dialogue Institute and the Aspen Institute's Citizenship and American Identity Program
- National Institute for Civil Discourse Key Principles and Best PracticesA handout on how to engage in civil discourse.
- Braver Angels Curricular ToolkitYour curricular toolkit includes the following components: • A fact sheet describing Braver Angels Debates. • A step-by-step process for getting started with constructing a class assignment. • Resources for creating a classroom assignment.
Books
Educating for Civic Dialogue in an Age of Uncivil Discourse by
Educating for Civic Dialogue in an Age of Uncivil Discourse addresses an urgent challenge--to help students learn the skills of civic engagement--by offering a framework for authentic cosmopolitan education. As an invitation to ongoing civil dialogue with diverse voices in the classroom, the book aims to foster the skills of democratic and global citizenship that allow students to find their voice as local, national, and global citizens outside of the classroom. It suggests practical ways that teachers can promote the skills of attentive listening, intelligent questioning, reasonable positioning, and responsible dialogue in order to encourage authentic civic discourse. It also outlines specific pedagogical strategies designed to foster students' cosmopolitan competencies as democratic and global citizens.
ISBN: 9781003003205Publication Date: 2020-03-23
Creating Space for Democracy by
Published in Association with and We live in divisive and polarizing times, often remaining in comfortable social bubbles and experiencing few genuine interactions with people who are different or with whom we disagree. Stepping out and turning to one another is difficult but necessary. For our democracy to thrive at a time when we face wicked problems that involve tough trade-offs it is vital that all citizens participate fully in the process. We need to learn to listen, think, and act with others to solve public problems. This collaborative task begins with creating space for democracy. This book provides a guide for doing so on campus through deliberation and dialogue. At the most basic level, this book describes collaborative and relational work to engage with others and co-create meaning. Specifically, dialogue and deliberation are processes in which a diverse group of people moves toward making a collective decision on a difficult public issue. This primer offers a blueprint for achieving the civic mission of higher education by incorporating dialogue and deliberation into learning at colleges and universities. It opens by providing a conceptual framework, with leading voices in the dialogue and deliberation field providing insights on issues pertinent to college campuses, from free speech and academic freedom to neutrality and the role of deliberation in civic engagement. Subsequent sections describe a diverse range of methods and approaches used by several organizations that pioneered and sustained deliberative practices; outline some of the many ways in which educators and institutions are using dialogue and deliberation in curricular, co-curricular, and community spaces, including venues such as student centers, academic libraries, and residence halls. All of the chapters, including a Resource Section, provide readers with a starting point for conceptualizing and implementing their own deliberation and dialogue initiatives. This book, intended for all educators who are concerned about democracy, imparts the power and impact of public talk, offers the insights and experiences of leading practitioners, and provides the grounding to adopt or adapt the models in their own settings to create educative spaces and experiences that are humanizing, authentic, and productive. It is an important resource for campus leaders, student affairs practitioners, librarians, and centers of institutional diversity, community engagement, teaching excellence and service-learning, as well as faculty, particularly those in the fields of communication studies, education, and political science. Click here for more information on AAC&Uand Campus Compact.
ISBN: 9781620369265Publication Date: 2019-10-21
The Political Classroom by
WINNER 2016 Grawemeyer Award in Education Helping students develop their ability to deliberate political questions is an essential component of democratic education, but introducing political issues into the classroom is pedagogically challenging and raises ethical dilemmas for teachers. Diana E. Hess and Paula McAvoy argue that teachers will make better professional judgments about these issues if they aim toward creating "political classrooms," which engage students in deliberations about questions that ask, "How should we live together?" Based on the findings from a large, mixed-method study about discussions of political issues within high school classrooms, The Political Classroom presents in-depth and engaging cases of teacher practice. Paying particular attention to how political polarization and social inequality affect classroom dynamics, Hess and McAvoy promote a coherent plan for providing students with a nonpartisan political education and for improving the quality of classroom deliberations.
Call Number: LC89 .H44 2014ISBN: 9780415880985Publication Date: 2014-11-26
Higher Education for Democracy by
Bronze Winner, 2021 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award in the Education Category Democracy and higher education are inextricably linked: universities not only have the ability to be key arbiters of how democracy is advanced, but they also need to reflect democratic values in their practices, objectives, and goals. Framed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the ongoing crisis of structural racism, Higher Education for Democracy explores academe's role in advancing democracy by using a cross-national comparison of Los Angeles, New Delhi, and Hong Kong to develop strategies that universities can employ to strengthen democracy and resist fascism. William G. Tierney argues that if academe is to be a progenitor in the advancement of democracy, then we need to consider five areas of change that have been significant across national contexts amid both globalization and neoliberalism: inequality, privatization, the public good, identity, and academic freedom. Taking a comparative approach and drawing on scholarly literature, archival research, and interviews, Higher Education for Democracy aims to understand these changes and their implications and to position higher education in defense of democracy in a globalized economy framed by fascism.
ISBN: 9781438484501Publication Date: 2021-07-01
Websites & Other Resources
- Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement - Center for Teaching Excellence ResourcesResources from UNCW's Center for Teaching Excellence on how to effectively teach with civic learning and democratic engagement. Requires self-enrollment in the Canvas course.
- Facing History & OurselvesFacing History & Ourselves uses lessons of history to challenge teachers and their students to stand up to bigotry and hate.
- Difficult DialoguesStrategies, activities, and resources from Vanderbilt University's Center for Teaching.
- Braver Angels Debate Chair TrainingA short, self-paced online course on how to be a Debate Chair and run a Braver Angels Debate on campus or in your classroom.