September 14, 2011 Democratic Deliberations and Self-Interest I am currently taking a special topics course on Citizenship Learning, Participatory Democracy, and Social Change. Even before starting the course, I knew I would be able to link much...
August 5, 2011 Scheduling a Student Discussion using Doodle As I was digging through old posts, I would like to add my thoughts to the topic “setting up student discussions” 18 months ago. I am particularly going to recommend...
July 27, 2011 Teaching How to Think About Policy One of the things that the Interactivity Foundation does is to teach people how to think about public policy possibilities. This will sound patronizing only if you misunderstand why, what,...
July 20, 2011 Discussion as Improv: Serve the Others New participants in an Interactivity Foundation discussion project often wonder how to act when taking part in the discussion. Often when people hear that we’ll be engaged in thoughtful civic...
July 1, 2011 Facilitating for Democratic Discussion IF’s mission is to “promote and enhance democratic discussion.” Not just any discussion, but democratic discussion. IF’s facilitators have a significant role to play in achieving this core aspect of...
April 7, 2011 Key Aspects of IF’s Public Discussions• At least four interactive aspects are critical to useful public discussion of IF’s Citizens Discussion Reports. 1. Facilitation is critical in public discussions of IF Citizens Staff Work Reports. There is nothing...
February 7, 2011 Stories of Unexpected Consequences What consequences might flow from a given policy possibility? It’s impossible to say for sure, but exploring this question is an important part of the IF discussion process. It helps...
January 10, 2011 Playing with Metaphors When IF project panels are beginning the transition to generating public policy ideas, I’ve found it helpful to have the panelists explore different metaphors for thinking about the policy area....
January 9, 2011 Learning from Experience A couple weeks ago, I facilitated a public discussion on Anticipating Genetic Technology with a group of individuals residing in the borough of Queens in New York City, and I...