The "Seminar" at Lawrence Academy

At Lawrence Academy, “seminars” are classes during which students demonstrate how well they prepare for and participate in a class discussion devoted to exploring assigned questions, topics, or texts.Success in seminars depends on students learning from teachers and from each other how better to listen, speak, use evidence, formulate thoughtful questions and answers, judge the relevance of each contribution to the discussion, and conduct themselves respectfully in discussions sustained and managed by students.

Seminars prize discovery and discussion over debate, collaboration over competition. The overall goal of a seminar is for students to assume greater responsibility for their own progress and the progress of the entire class in understanding a topic or text. Along the way, seminars help reinforce what is critical to student-centered learning: active learning (not watching from the sidelines), keeping an open mind, and relying on careful analysis of evidence to support or refute conclusions–all with a seriousness of purpose and a spirit of experimentation that makes intellectual inquiry both genuine and enjoyable.

Among the most important lessons of a seminar is that the students speak to each other, not the teacher.