Street Law has added three new Socratic Seminar resources for high school classrooms, giving students more opportunities to engage with complex historical, civic, and legal topics through thoughtful, evidence-based discussion.
Socratic Seminars are structured, student-centered discussions that use rich texts and open-ended questions to encourage close reading, critical thinking, and thoughtful dialogue. Street Law has added three new high school Socratic Seminars designed to help students dig into complex historical and civic topics.
Our newest seminars include:
- Origins of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict explores the modern historical origins of the conflict, with a particular focus on the World War I era. Students examine sources including the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence and the Balfour Declaration as they consider how historical events and competing perspectives shaped the conflict.
- Voting Laws invites students to examine voting laws in their own state and across the United States, discuss the questions those laws raise, and extend their learning by comparing voting laws in other countries.
- Philosophers and Democratic Revolutions asks students to explore connections between political philosophy and democratic revolutions through excerpts from John Locke, Simón Bolívar, and the Declaration of Independence.
New to the strategy? Read our guide to using Socratic Seminars to foster critical conversations, including tips for selecting texts, developing questions, facilitating discussion, and reflecting afterward.
