Student Voice is key to student learning. Think about what motivates you more to learn something. Likely it’s where you have a say in what is being explored and/or how the practices and products will take shape. Our learners are no different.

Here are resources of guides and strategies to empower student voices. It begins with key steps for planning, which is a good reflective framework to ensure that the use of any strategies listed below have the desired effect. The articles at the end of this post offer deeper perspective if you so choose 🙂

• Interest-based choices
• Interest centers (also applies to middle and high school students)
• Genius Hour
• Design Thinking
• Maker Spaces – Example: Schools That Work
• Student-Led Conferences
  • Edutopia: Schools That Work
  • Using Student-Led Parent-Teacher Conferences to Build Relationships
  • When Students Lead Parent-Teacher Conferences
  • An Introduction to Student-Led Conferences

• 70+ Social Media Tools for learning
• Shared development of Norms (example 1 –  example 2 – framework)
• Question Formulation Technique
• Protocols
  • Socratic Seminars
  • Spider (Harkness) Discussion
  • Fishbowl
  • The Final Word (PDF)

Additional Readings

• Student-Centered Learning: It Starts With the Teacher

• Establishing a Culture of Student Voice

• Giving Students Charge of How They Learn

• Fostering Student Questions: Strategies for Inquiry-Based Learning