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    Building Community

    For students to feel empowered to share ideas freely, instructors must work to foster a classroom culture that is both caring and challenging, safe and supportive. Such a culture seldom materializes by happenstance, and building it must be a sustained effort throughout the semester. With community in mind, effective instructors consider how to set up the physical environment, how to encourage intellectual risk-taking, and how to model appropriate discussion behaviors, such as active listening and responding to one another respectfully.

    How might we get to know our students...

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    Our Story

    Origin

    When she first joined the faculty at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, Professor Meira Levinson identified as “an 8th grade classroom teacher who happened to find herself in a university.” Straddling these two contexts, eager to bridge academic rigor with the reflective practices she knew from K-12 classrooms, Levinson became interested in the idea of an online platform where Harvard...

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    IM Live Session #3: Including More Student Voices in the Conversation

    In this session, Gretchen Brion-Meisels leads participants through a World Café protocol in a demonstration lesson. Over three rounds, participants move between small groups for discussion about participation. Gretchen moves between groups to listen and share ideas.

    After the demonstration, Gretchen and Monik Jimenez discuss the way the activity was scaffolded to encourage participation, as well as other strategies Gretchen uses in her classroom to bring in student voice. (Date: February 28, 2023)

    IM Live Session #4: Beyond The Paper Chase: Learning from Legal Pedagogy

    In this session, Todd Rakoff facilitates a discussion of a short case he uses with his students on their first day of Law School, relying largely on Socratic questioning and cold calling to draw out participants’ thinking. Participants also watch a brief video of that HLS class in action.

    After the teaching demonstration, Meira Levinson leads the group in a collective reflection on Todd’s instructional strategies and the implications for their own practice. (November 18, 2019)

    Educating for Equity and Inclusion

    As post-secondary classrooms become increasingly diverse, instructors must ensure that their practices work effectively for all students in the room. In inclusive classrooms, students from all backgrounds feel welcomed and valued, particularly those students whose race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, nationality, or perceived ability might have led them to feel excluded in other classrooms. In equitable classrooms, all students experience a curriculum that feels relevant and engaging to them, and students are able achieve their academic goals with support from...

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