Talking Circles/Fishbowl Discussions

To help students see their community as a place of significance, a place of positive change, and a place where their voices are heard. Talking Circles can be used as a platform for discussion of academic topics that are particularly challenging for students.

Students will be able to engage in higher level thinking through academic conversation.

• Establish norms of the Talking Circle, such as utilizing a Talking Piece, which designates who is being invited to speak, as well as a Circle Keeper, a role that all students will have a turn at.
• To create a Fishbowl: students seated inside the “fishbowl” actively participate, ask questions, share opinions, and respond to teacher questions while students standing outside listen carefully. The two groups switch roles afterwards.

• Talking Circles
• Facing History Fishbowl

Facing History and Ourselves (2021) Retrieved December 2021 from https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/teaching-strategies/fishbowl

Bintliff, Amy. (2014, July 22) Learning Justice Magazine. Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved February 2022 from https://www.learningforjustice.org/magazine/talking-circles-for-restorative-justice-and-beyond