Paradoxical Questioning with Continuum

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I've been diving into more and more information on the topic of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL). As educators we are now pretty familiar with the relevance (and importance) of the topic. I've been working through some ideas on how to present SEL content to team builders since we, pretty much, spend a good deal of time helping people work on social growth. How can we (team builders) recognize and encourage SEL concepts? (This has been my guiding question in my search for ideas.)

In my search, I picked up Tara Flippos book, Social and Emotional Learning in Action: Experiential Activities to Positively Impact School Climate. Tara tells us, "Social and Emotional Learning in Action (SELA) is an easy-to-use sourcebook [a 36-lesson progression] facilitated by teaching and/or counseling practitioners primarily in school settings." Each lesson (for the most part) has two activities and a debrief process. It's a nice progression of community-building activities and when you know and understand the CASEL.org framework and the five competency areas, you can blend the SEL language into the lessons.  

One of the 'nuggets' in the book for me was reading about Paradoxical Questioning. (Those of you already doing this, Kudos to you - it's pretty interesting.) Tara shared this method in the debriefing activity she calls Continuum. (This 'rating' activity has been around for a while, but I can't put my finger on a source just yet.) During face-to-face programs you lay out a rope in a straight line designate one end as zero and the other end as a ten. You provide a question for participants to 'rate/score' for themselves - like, Where do you stand on..." or What score would you give to our.....(insert behavior here)" For the virtual version, develop a presentation slide (area) with the scale and question on it like the one above. Then, participants annotate themselves (their name) near the number they choose to score. 

Traditionally, I then question participants by asking them something like, "Jennifer, you rated communication an eight. What would the group have to do to get a score of nine?" Same with the other end of the scale. "Felix, what would it take from the group for you to give them a three?" I don't ask for BIG leaps, just, what would it take to go up one number - baby steps. 

Here's where the paradoxical comes in. Instead of asking participants how the group can improve, ask them to share what information they used to come up with the score they chose. For example, Tara shared, "to low-rating students, you could ask what allowed them to be a 3/10 instead of a 0/10" - seeking the positive in a low-rated evaluation. Even with the high-rating participants - "What qualities from the group led you to score an eight?" Yes, you could go on to talk about improvement. And, what about simply stating the 'good stuff' and then moving on?

Sometimes it's just the simply things that can light a new path. Come to think of it, it's often the simple things that lead to the biggest changes. 

If you have any other paradoxical ideas, we'd love to hear about them. Leave us a Comment! 

Be well...

Chris Cavert, Ed.D.