Great Books Academy Socratic Discussions

At the Great Books Academy there are three basic learning methods or activities: memorizing, being coached, and discussing. At the GBA, all three activities are employed at some point, with overlapping methods through the years. At first, students memorize basic rules and concepts such as those relating to grammar, spelling, and arithmetic. It is coaching that helps a student to learn to read, write, etc. Coaching is best done one-on-one, so naturally, homeschooling is best for this.

The GBA will augment its text-based homeschool curriculum by conducting bi-weekly Socratic seminar discussion groups over the Internet with live-audio.  These discussion groups begin at the 3rd grade level, but are largely preparatory until the high school program. As advances in Internet video technology allow, the entire high school program will eventually become exclusively based upon the great books and conducted via full-motion-video Internet conferencing, moderated by a GBA tutor, and including the participation of homeschool students from around the world. It bears stressing at this point that the aim of the discussion group is not to prepare students for tests (though they will indeed be prepared), but rather, to produce liberally educated individuals in order that they may live free and happy lives.

This naturally follows when individuals increase their understanding of themselves, their world, the characteristics of the intellect, the nature of virtue, and the methods and benefits of life-long learning. The principle aim of the GBA program as a whole is to provide society with increasing numbers of such individuals so as to ensure a solid foundation for a free and civilized society. This is because even the most wise and educated man must have a civilized society in which to be happy and free.

While we may find teachers in the classroom, or in the great books, the final responsibility and authority for the day to day education of children lies with their parents. The GBA recognizes this as a fact of nature.  This is true whether the student is studying from a text book at home, or participating in a great books seminar online. In the latter case, the online tutors are themselves still learning. To think otherwise would be to betray the aim of becoming a life-long learner.

Also, for a tutor to proclaim that his own particular response to a particularly difficult question was the correct answer, and then to foist his “answer” upon the students of the group, would be to betray the discussion mode itself. That is to say, a tutor forcing an answer would undermine the fundamental attempt to get students to grapple with the issue themselves in order to formulate their own conclusions, and thus hone their own intellectual skills. The discussion tutors are moderators and guides, not sources of “correct answers” to the great questions over which even the greatest minds in history have disagreed. The tutors are themselves simply students with a bit more experience. The faculty are the authors of the great books.