Taking the time to talk about issues that matter: A dialogic approach to teaching Society & Environment

An extensive body of research from within both cognitive psychology and the Philosophy for Children programme consistently demonstrates that engaging students of all ages in class discussions of real‐world issues results in a raft of positive educational and social outcomes. Benefits include the development of critical reasoning skills, increases in scores of English comprehension, vocabulary and mathematical understandings, improvements in social skills and a decrease in behaviour management problems. Moreover, when students are given the opportunity to engage in ongoing discussions with their peers about real‐world social and environmental issues that matter – significant issues such as climate change, children’s rights and poverty ‐ the effects can be profound. Indeed, dedicating time for discussion of such issues within Society & Environment programmes has been shown to foster students’ interest in and deep understanding of social and environmental issues and to support the development of ethical reasoning skills and dispositions. Drawing on a series of real‐life vignettes from Society & Environment classrooms, this paper describes the processes involved in effectively facilitating whole class discussions of significant social and environmental issues. The paper also highlights the rich rewards to be had by students and teachers, and by society as a whole, when we take the time to talk about issues that matter in Society & Environment.