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Session 5. Values, Discussion and Assessing Understanding and Action
Objective. Lead a structured, respectful discussion of an environmental trade-off, and assess pupils' reasoning, skills and action with a simple three-level rubric without judging beliefs or family habits.
Environmental questions are rarely only about facts. They are also about what people value: income, health, fairness, the future. If you avoid the values, pupils meet them anyway in the playground and online, without rules for listening. If you teach them well, pupils learn to give reasons, use evidence and respect people who disagree. This lesson shows how to lead such a discussion and how to assess what pupils learn without grading their beliefs.
Key ideas
Why people disagree
- Most environmental questions are trade-offs between things people value: income and clean water, cheap heating and clean air, convenience and less waste. Reasonable people weigh them differently.
- Separate two kinds of disagreement: about facts (which can be checked) and about values (which can be explained and listened to, not proved).
- Your job is to teach pupils to reason well, not to tell them which side to take. Be open about facts you are sure of and fair about values.
Structures that keep talk respectful
- Agree ground rules first: ideas not people or families, a reason with every view, listen and say back what you heard, it is fine to change your mind.
- Use structures: think-pair-share, role cards with facts for each role, four corners (agree, disagree, not sure, need more facts), or a fishbowl where a few speak and the rest listen.
- Role cards let pupils argue a view that is not theirs. This protects those whose families are directly involved, such as farming families, and builds understanding of other people.
What to assess, and what not to
- Assess four things: knowledge (explain a cause chain), skills (read a source, draw a system map), reasoning about values (give reasons and evidence for a view), and action (what pupils planned, did and learned).
- Do not grade pupils' personal beliefs, their feelings about nature or what their families do at home. That is unfair and may embarrass them.
- Make criteria visible before the task, so pupils know that reasons and evidence earn credit, whichever side they choose.
Simple evidence and feedback
- Use a three-level rubric (Beginning, Developing, Secure) with three criteria: reason, evidence, other views. Describe each level in plain words pupils can read.
- Collect small evidence: exit tickets, a project logbook with the before and after numbers, a system map, a short written view. Five good pieces beat a long test.
- Give feedback on the next step ('add a fact for your second reason') and report to parents with what pupils learned and did, not with worry.
Three levels of supporting a view
Your stance in a values discussion
Be committed to facts and balanced about values. Where a question can be checked, such as whether a canal leaks, say what the evidence is. Where reasonable people differ, such as how to weigh farm income against a nearby well, present more than one view and ask pupils to give reasons. If pupils ask what you think, you may answer, but say that it is your view and that they are free to disagree.
Prepare for strong feeling. Some topics are personal because they touch family work or home heating. Agree ground rules before the topic arises, use role cards so that nobody has to defend their own family, and be ready to pause and ask pupils to say back what they heard. The Council of Europe pack offers many structures you can adapt.
Assess what can fairly be assessed
You can assess knowledge (explaining a cause chain), skills (reading a source, drawing a system map), reasoning about values (a view with reasons and evidence) and action (what pupils planned, did and learned). You should not assess whether a pupil cares, what they believe, or what their family does at home.
A three-level rubric with criteria such as reason, evidence and other views is enough. Share it before the task and describe each level in plain words. Feedback should name the next step: 'add a fact to your second reason'. With parents, report what pupils learned and did, rather than whether they are 'good' at caring for nature.
Examples from the classroom
Four corners about the school lawn
Scene. In Samarkand, Dilnoza's Grade 8 class considers whether the school should keep watering its lawn or plant trees that need less water. Pupils stand in corners marked agree, disagree, not sure and need more facts. Each corner explains its reason, and pupils may move after hearing others. Dilnoza writes the facts pupils ask for on the board and sets them as the next homework.
Insight. Four corners makes disagreement visible and safe, and 'need more facts' becomes a legitimate position.
A fishbowl on winter heating
Scene. In Tashkent, Aziz's Grade 10 class holds a fishbowl: five pupils sit in the middle with role cards for a household, a clinic, a heating company, the city and a pupil; the others observe with a checklist of ground rules. They use the World Bank summary sentence on sources of winter pollution as their common fact. After ten minutes, observers report how well reasons were given.
Insight. Roles protect pupils' families and shift attention from who is right to how well each view is supported.
Levelling exit tickets in Grade 6
Scene. After a lesson on waste in Fergana, Malika asks pupils for two sentences: a view and a reason with a fact. She sorts 30 tickets into Beginning, Developing and Secure using a rubric posted on the wall. Eight tickets lack a fact, so next lesson she begins with one example of adding a fact and lets pupils revise their own sentence.
Insight. A simple rubric turns exit tickets into feedback that tells you what to teach next.
Common pitfalls
- Assessing whether pupils agree with the teacher or with a 'correct' position.
- Letting a discussion run without ground rules, so the loudest voice or a family is singled out.
- Using real local conflicts or named families as the discussion example.
- Giving marks only for the final action and ignoring the reasoning and learning along the way.
Role-Card Discussion and Rubric
- Open the Activity Kit: a SAMPLE mahalla dilemma, five role cards, ground rules and a three-level rubric.
- Groups of five (15 min): each takes a role card and argues that role for 2 minutes each, then the group agrees or fails to agree on a choice. One person is the timekeeper; follow the ground rules, including 'say back what you heard'.
- Pairs (10 min): level the three sample pupil statements with the rubric. Explain each level with words from the statement.
- Groups (10 min): decide how you would respond if a pupil says, 'My father uses a lot of water for cotton, so you are saying he is bad.' Write two sentences you could say.
- Alone (5 min): write your classroom action task from the Kit.
Your facilitator will guide you through this activity in the session.
Questions to discuss
- Which role was hardest to argue, and what did you learn about that person's view?
- What in the rubric helped you decide between 'Developing' and 'Secure'?
- What will you say first when a pupil takes a comment personally?
Reflect
- Which topic in your subject would produce the most disagreement, and why?
- What would make you feel safe leading such a discussion?
- What evidence of learning do you already collect that you could use?
Try it tomorrow
- Write five ground rules with pupils and keep them on the wall for every environmental discussion.
- Run a four-corners or role-card discussion of 15 minutes on a small local trade-off.
- Level five pupil statements with the three-criterion rubric and note one thing to teach next.
Further reading and links
Teach pupils to reason, not to agree; assess reasons, evidence and action, never beliefs or families.