DIALOGUE FOR RECIPROCITY Diane Maodush-Pitzer Danielle Lake

GETTING STARTED… 1.Please introduce yourself & then answer the following: 2. Why do you value community engaged teaching? 3. What challenges have you faced/do you foresee when students work with community partners? -------------------------- “Anytime you are going to do community engagement it starts with listening – if we don’t start there, we are in trouble.”

OBJECTIVES One Two Three Four Understand the value and role of dialogue when trying to collaborate with a diverse group of others. Provide pedagogical tools for fostering dialogic virtues and practices. Offer in-class engagement activities, assignment ideas, and community-engaged project suggestions designed to help students “work with” community partners. Apply/revise any one or more recommended practices so its fits your own course needs. OVERARCHING GOAL: Provide YOU with tools for helping students employ quality dialogic practices / good listening skills for working WITH community partners OBJECTIVES: Define dialogue and reciprocity Provide helpful examples/assignment ideas for encouraging students to employ effective dialogic skills Ask you consider how you can revise & use one suggested activity from today Have you share what was valuable and how you might put it to use in your own class Give you some further resources in case you are interested in learning more about Dialogue for Reciprocity (links, reading suggestions, handout, etc.)

Explores underlying causes & assumptions – Frame problem SUSPEND REFLECTIVE DIALOGUE Explores underlying causes & assumptions – Frame problem SUSPEND “Listen w/o resistance” CONVERSATION “to turn together” DELIBERATION “to weight out” GENERATIVE DIALOGUE New insights, Ingenuity, creativity DEFEND “to ward off” -- Modified from William Isaac’s Dialogue and the Art of Thinking Together, 1999

Dialogue is about LEARNING. Debate is about WINNING. What is dialogue? Dialogue is about LEARNING. Debate is about WINNING. Assume that others have a piece of the answer Assume there is one right answer – and you have it Collaborative Combative About finding common ground. About winning Listen to understand and find basis for disagreement Listen to find flaws and make counter-arguments Inspecting your assumptions. Defending your assumptions Discovering new possibilities and opportunities Seeking an outcome that agrees with your position.

RECIPROCITY Are we talking ‘at’ or ‘with’?

TEACHING Democratic Thinking & Action CO-CREATE RULES Build, test, and revise ground rules Participatory Virtues BUILD COMMUNITY Foster opportunities for community-building (TRUST) RE-DISTRIBUTE POWER Give students more ownership Employ Experiential learning Employ experiential learning model

Example one: Viewpoint Learning Ground rules Speak only for yourself, not as a representative of any group Treat everyone as an equal: leave role, status, and stereotypes at the door Be open and listen to others even when you disagree Search for assumptions Look for common ground Keep dialogue and decision-making separate http://www.viewpointlearning.com/about-us/ground-rules-for- dialogue/

PARTICIPATORY VIRTUES Co-create practice Research & Compare Reflect & Discuss Revise

Experimentalism “Listen fully.” “Act with courage, while remaining open to others.” “Respect one another by respecting our differences.” “Think critically by engaging tension and digging deeper.”

Example 2: World café 1. Clarify the Purpose 2. Create a Hospital Space 3. Explore Questions that Matter 4. Encourage Everyone’s Contributions 5. Connect Diverse Perspectives 6. Listen for insights and share discoveries

EXAMPLE 4: ENCOURAGE COMMUNITY Foster Perplexity Focus on Context Integrate Narrative Expand Ethical Framework Aim for Collaboration & Ingenuity

STUDENT OWNERSHIP USE EXPERIENCE: OBSERVE & REFLECT: Asks students to engage in an experience OBSERVE & REFLECT: Requires students to carefully observe and reflect on the experience from multiple perspectives INTEGRATE & CREATE: Requires students integrate observations with course content and develop concepts/theories/hypotheses about the issue EXPERIMENT & REVISE: Asks students to put their theory/hypothesis to the test and reflect on what they’ve learned by doing so See examples 5, 6, & 7

Acknowledge the views present begin with values We cannot engage genuinely in dialogue when we ignore our “lived experiences,” our feelings, our “vulnerability and anger,” and “the body that carries these feelings and experiences” (Freema Elbaz-Luwisch, 2004, p. 9, 13). Begin with Values Acknowledge the views present

COMMON GROUND??? The area “between” Can we find common ground with others? Yes Parker Palmer, Healing the Heart of Democracy PRO-LIFE? PRO-CHOICE? PRO-DIALOGUE http://www.onbeing.org/program/pro-life-pro-choice-pro- dialogue/4863/audio?embed=1

THE ART OF THINKING TOGETHER Dialogue Assume integrity Slow down Suspend Listen Create a space Befriend polarity THE ART OF THINKING TOGETHER William Isaacs, 1999

ENCOURAGE A RIGHT TO DISAGREE “Protecting our right to disagree is one of democracy’s gifts, and converting this inevitable tension into CREATIVE ENERGY is part of democracy’s genius” (9).

CREATIVE TENSION Tension = a condition to be relieved Reduce eliminate Stress Ill health Reduce eliminate Tension = a productive energy “Stress of being stretched by alien ideas, values, and experiences” (13).

Open listening RESPECT different perspectives, cultures, and professions, RESIST privileging one above another, RECOGNIZE the role of conflict, INTEGRATE insights from different perspectives into a plausible explanation.

PROCESSES, FORMATS, & TOOLS DELIBERATIVE DESIGN FACILITATION TOOLS Town hall meetings, National Issues forums, Consensus Conferences, Planning Cells, citizen juries, online dialogues participatory policy action research T-charts, Decision Matrixes, Force-field Analyses, Bridge Building, Mind Mapping, Zig-Zag Decision Making Etc.

Example 8 TEAM PERFORMANCE MODEL Orient across differences Build Trust and establish community Clarify goals Commit to actions Implement

JUDGING DELIBERATION SIX ESSENTIALS Reasoned opinion expressed References to external sources articulated Expressions of disagreement given Equal levels of participation Structure and topic cohere Engagement between participants Jennifer Stromer-Galley (2007). “Measuring Deliberation’s Content: A Coding Scheme.” Journal of Public Deliberation. 3 (1): 1-12.

Discussion audit What ideas were generated? Solutions? Where was there disagreement? What was the level of consensus? How might ideas generated have an impact? Revised from Brookfield & Preskill (2005)

DELIBERATION PROBLEMS BENEFITS Procedural Ethical “Group Think” “Cascade effects” Reinforce extremism Reinforce social bias Challenge narrow perspectives Community involvement in community problems Co-create transformational solutions & innovative policy

YOUR TURN Consider how you might design an activity (or assignment) for one of your own courses that utilizes any of the recommendations given.