ABSTRACT
Conducting a Socratic dialogue in the classroom is an art that requires practice and experience. For all of the planning that the Socratic Method entails, the spontaneous participation of the students is an absolute necessity, or the experience becomes a very odd kind of interactive monologue. Providing a preparation sheet with the concept, the reading or viewing assignment, and preliminary questions facilitates participation. With these fundamental elements understood, the experience becomes more familiar and more meaningful. The goal of Socratic questioning is not to learn a few points about a text, but to think critically about a concept, issue, or problem, patiently considering other points of view. What makes the teaching experience continuously fascinating and challenging is that every class, every single student, is different. The learning of the students is on two rails: the first is the investigation of the selected claim, concept, issue, or problem; the second is the process itself of critical thinking.
