ABSTRACT
The role of the teacher in a Socratic circle involves assessing student performance and creating follow-up activities and assignments to extend the learning. One of the most important types of assessment that can occur within Socratic circles is the informal assessment of student performance both by the teacher and by the students themselves. The author completes three primary types of informal assessment as he observes the dialogue in his room: note taking, scorekeeping, and mapmaking. Whereas informal assessments greatly assist students in improving their dialogue skills and provide cursory information for outside observers, formal assessment can provide a much more structured and measurable analysis of student growth. The author have found that the most productive formal assessment to be the use of a rubric to gauge student performance in Socratic circles. With all of the various forms of assessment, there is ample opportunity and information to assign grades for Socratic circles, if a teacher so desires.
