What is the Socratic Method?

Some Thoughts to Challenge and Encourage

I joined the world of classical learning some 15-16 years ago. I joined the world of classical teaching about 10 years ago. Every year that passes I learn and grow and my conceptions of things change and (hopefully) deepen. One of the first ideas I remember being introduced to in the world of classical education was that of teaching by the “Socratic Method”. This approach is heralded by many classical Christian Schools as an essential part of the classical learning process.

In a nutshell, the Socratic Method is a means of inquiry into a particular subject through asking clarifying questions. The value of this approach (over and against didactic methods of instruction such as lecture) is that it invites the learner to be an actively engaged participant who discovers truth rather than just being told what is true. Nevertheless, this approach, if not executed well, can also be rather disastrous. Some versions of what passes for “Socratic Method” are little more than a group of students simply saying what they think, or how they feel, about what they are reading or discussing without any evidence or reason to support them. In the worst cases the teacher does not even have an object in mind as to where the discussion ought to go or how to get there. Perhaps the teacher isn’t even sure what a good question about the matter looks like. “Socratic inquiry” can quickly become aimless meandering without ever landing on anything like objective truth and reality.

How might we avoid such problems in our own classrooms?

I wish to offer a thesis concerning the Socratic Method which I believe will help us to avoid the very real pitfalls of this approach. My primary thesis is that the Socratic method has two different modus operandi (modes of operation). For our purposes let us name the first mode “Socratic Discussion” and let us name the second mode “Socratic Teaching”. In my view, the failure to understand and distinguish between these two modes leads to confusion in the classroom and it harms the educational process we are seeking to provide to our students.

Concerning the first mode of Socratic Method, “Socratic Discussion,” a more precise and technical term would be dialectic. The word dialectic comes from the Greek διαλεκτική and essentially means “the art of discourse.” The idea, however, goes beyond just how to be an interesting conversationalist. The dialectic method involves two or more parties, typically with opposing opinions, asking one another questions while seeking understanding, clarity, and (ideally) agreement on the truth of the matter. One person may be right and the other wrong, they might both be right in part but not in whole, they may both be completely in error, but through asking the clarifying questions and cross examining one another (while firmly believing in objective existence and knowability of truth) the conversation leads to greater light and hopefully a reconciliation with the truth for all involved.

Sometimes Socrates used the dialectic with friends and, therefore, with a more friendly tone. Sometimes he used the dialectic with enemies and his superior question asking abilities made their foolishness evident. In all cases he invited his interlocutors to have an equal share in the discussion. He did not mind if they turned down any particular corridor in pursuit of the main topic of discussion, but he alway brought them back to the central issue if they got too far off topic.

One critical thing to note is that Socrates’ use of dialectic is virtually always with fully grown and educated men. Men who are expected to have the requisite education and liberal learning to inquire into the highest matters of importance to human affairs such as religion, politics, war, morality, aesthetics, etc. Some of his interlocutors are clearly “young men” but they are almost always adult men. This fact should lead us to carefully consider the following question: Ought we to practice Socratic Discussion (dialectic) with children?

I believe the answer is no.

To practice the dialectic we must assume that we are essentially talking to fully educated persons who have the background experience and education to deal with these weighty topics. We must also assume that they already have an established opinion on the matter we are discussing (presumably with reasons to back it up). None of this is true of a 7th grader nor even of many 12th graders. Until one has completed the full course of a Liberal Arts education they are really not qualified to enter into the dialectic in a way that will benefit them or the people they are talking to. They must first have filled their cup to the full before the overflow can spill upon others in a helpful way. In an ideal world it is our pastors, politicians, and other societal leaders who should be practicing the dialectic and seeking what is true, good, and beautiful for the common good of our people.

So, what of our classical Christian students in classical Christian schools? No more Socratic anything? No, there is still room for Socratic influence. It is, however, from the other mode which they ought to be primarily drinking.

Socratic Teaching is what our students should be getting from us. What is the difference? The prime example comes from Plato’s Meno. In Meno Socrates is discussing the question of virtue with a man named Meno and trying to establish its essence (the form of virtue itself). In the midst of this discussion, however, comes a very fascinating discussion about Socrates’ and Plato’s thesis that all knowledge is already inside us, stored up from past lives, but that it is locked away in us from the process of reincarnation. According to Greek and Roman tradition, prior to reincarnation, men must pass through the river Lethe in the underworld which washes away their memories. Socrates tells Meno that he can unlock this indwelling knowledge in the boy by simply asking questions. Socrates “proves” to Meno that this is true by taking a young boy, one of Meno’s slaves (who does not have a full or liberal education which a grown free man would have) and asking him questions. Socrates leads the boy to conclusions about Geometry (even though the boy has never studied it before) simply by asking basic questions in succession.

Far from proving the doctrine of ἀνάμνησις (remembrance), what Socrates does prove is the power of leading people to truth by asking directed questions. Ask any good lawyer about this power when asking questions to a witness or suspect on the stand, they can tell you all about it! This is Socratic Teaching rather than Socratic discussion. Note the key difference is that the teacher already has in mind the object he wants to impart to the student. The teacher doesn’t ask questions he doesn’t know the answer to. The teacher designs a series of questions, starting with truths that are either obvious, implicit, or already known, and systematically builds from those axioms by asking leading questions until the student “discovers” the truth he is being aimed at.

The process of Socratic teaching requires the teacher to have knowledge in advance of their subject, to know what lesson he or she wants the students to learn, and to craft careful questions to lead the students to the truth without simply giving them the answers. This process requires practice, it requires patience, it requires learning about the various kinds of questions there are to ask and what power they have to direct students’ thinking. In other words, it requires a real teacher and it demands a significant amount of work from them in advance (no free passes to Easy-teaching-ville).

The benefit of this approach is tremendously valuable because of the way it involves students in the learning process. The process also teaches students, by example and practice, how to ask the right kind of questions themselves. Socratic teaching is preparation for Socratic discussion (dialectic), but we mustn’t put the cart before the horse. Socratic teaching is an exciting way to explore ideas and it doesn’t allow for passivity in learning. No amount of Socratic teaching, however, replaces the need for students to read great books, to listen to lectures on history, to learn musical notation and how to play an instrument, to memorize Latin endings, etc. These things go together alongside Socratic teaching and the more you read Plato the more you’ll realize that he thought so too.

So, let us be clear and make proper distinctions. Let us make use of Socratic teaching as part of the process of classical education so that we might produce fully formed and educated thinkers who can engage in dialectic and thereby continue to refine themselves and their neighbors in the truth.