One part of the class discussion that stuck with me was Abby’s comment that Socrates’ method could be harmful to his interlocutors. The way he debates is aggressive and off putting, and not only do his interlocutors leave knowing less about the topic they’re discussing than they’d known before, but they also feel worse about themselves.
In classrooms every day teachers have to find the right way of addressing incorrect answers, or ones that aren’t well thought through. There are a few different tactics I’ve noticed that my professors use that I’ve found really interesting and effective that I wanted to talk about in this blog, and I want to hear if any of you guys have noticed better or worse ways that your own professors have dealt with steering a student toward the right answer without hurting their self-confidence.
The first that came to mind was one of the computer science professors I’ve had. When he asked questions of the class and a student got a question wrong, he was often able to turn it around to sound correct. He would rephrase the student’s answer in such a way that he’d pick out only the parts that lead to the right answer, and then he’d thank them for their answer. In that way, a student’s self-confidence was always left intact, but it was unambiguously clear to the rest of the class what the right answer was.
The second method that came to mind was used a lot by teachers at a computer science summer camp for elementary school students that I interned at. In CS we use the term “bug” to refer to a piece of code that’s causing the program to work in a different way than we’re intending it to. In this classroom, the teachers were using the word “bug” in reference to the code, but also in reference to their or their students’ thought processes. So if one of the teachers asked “How many times does this for loop run?” and a student said “five” when the answer was “four,” the teacher would say “I think we have a bug here because…, and maybe we can debug this by…”
After a few weeks of camp I had a conversation with one of the CS education researchers about how the teachers were using the term “bug.” It had bothered me at first because in my mind, “bug” should only refer to code. The researcher asked me what I thought a bug was, and I said that it was a mistake made by the programmer, but that in CS culture it’s seen as an issue separate from the programmer despite the fact that the programmer caused it. The end of the conversation left me realizing that “debugging” can be used for anything, and that if all mistakes were treated as separate from the person who caused it, school and learning might be less scary.
I think that Socrates used this method for himself when he referred to his own thoughts as “hypotheses.” By making his opinions separate from his sense of self, he was making himself immune from being hurt if and when those opinions were proven wrong. Socrates wasn’t generous enough, though, to bestow that armor on his interlocutors. Rather, he forced them to acknowledge their opinions as their own beliefs. I wonder if Plato did this to make the interlocutors embodiments of their own opinions. Or I wonder if Socrates made them feel as though their beliefs were connected to their sense of self so that there would be more emotion in the arguments. Maybe the interlocutors wouldn’t care enough to keep arguing if they considered their beliefs to be separate from who they were.
Education 
Hi Kaitlyn,
This is a really interesting post! I think your question gets at a significant aspect of the practice of applying the Socratic method to contemporary classrooms. I want to address a few of the things you said, so this will be a little bit disorganized.
First, quickly, I don’t agree that Socrates’ interlocutors leave the conversations knowing less. As Socrates believes, true ignorance is thinking you know something that you don’t know. I think people leave conversations with Socrates knowing more about what they don’t know, which gives them a fuller and more nuanced understanding of the question at hand.
Second, I also don’t necessarily think people leave the conversations feeling worse about themselves, either. For one, as we mentioned in class, I think they go into discussion with Socrates expecting, and even seeking, to be made to question their beliefs. Also, I think Socrates attracts a certain kind of person- namely someone who already has a strong belief in their own intelligence and a desire to expand it. Lastly, Socrates makes sure to keep his interlocutors egos up throughout the conversations by diminishing his own intelligence and authority, and by complimenting them (as you mentioned, this could be a tactic to keep them committed to continuing the conversation). All this being said, the same isn’t true for everyone. In a typical classroom, I think Socrates’ method would leave most students feeling demoralized and dejected.
I am also interested in the question of how to make sure students don’t feel discouraged when teachers correct their incorrect or misguided answers. Although this is important, I also think it is crucial to be clear with them when they are wrong. In my opinion, the first method you describe could lead students to be confused about the thing they misunderstood. When they are approaching a problem similar to the one they got wrong, they might remember getting positive feedback about their answer rather than remembering the flaw or mistake in the answer they gave. I think this could cause students to repeat mistakes rather than learning from them.
I like the “debugging” method you described, and the idea of phrasing mistakes as separate from the person who made them. I like this because it still clearly addresses the error and allows the student to understand what was wrong about their answer, but it doesn’t affect their own feeling about themselves as much. I also think this approach lends itself to a growth mindset, because it addresses mistakes as opportunities to learn and understand more deeply, rather than personal failures.
Thanks again for your contribution! I enjoyed reading your examples and thinking about how they relate to and differ from Socrates’ methods.
Catherine
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