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For Teachers

Use our online lessons, teaching strategies, and classroom exercises to boost student engagement, foster belonging, and facilitate constructive dialogue about challenging topics.

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Professional Development

Our professional development for high school teachers provides practical strategies to foster and facilitate constructive dialogue in the classroom. These interactive workshops offer educators hands-on experience with essential practices, routines, and skills designed to elevate student voice, promote inclusion & belonging, and prepare students for democratic citizenship.

Sign up for our newsletter to receive updates about workshop offerings. 

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Overview

Our online program, Perspectives, is a free, interactive online learning program that explores the inner workings of the mind and the psychological roots of our ideological differences.

The program provides students with insights to better understand themselves and others and equips them with skills to engage in constructive dialogue across differences.

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Flexible & Customizable

Customize the Perspectives program’s settings to meet the needs of your course.

You can use the full program, or you can “build your own” experience by selecting which lessons you’d like your students to complete. You can also decide whether to include peer-to-peer conversations, and you can set your students' learning schedule.

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Free Online Lessons

Our research-based lessons weave together psychological concepts with interactive practice scenarios. Each lesson is adaptive, tailoring itself to meet learners where they are.

Lessons take approx. 30 minutes to complete and can be assigned as homework. Each lesson includes graded quiz questions to test comprehension.

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In this lesson, students:

  • Experientially learn about the two systems in our mind: automatic and controlled thinking.

  • Discover common cognitive biases that affect our reasoning, and how this leads people to interpret the same information differently.

  • Gain a practical technique to challenge their cognitive biases and gain more control over their thinking

In this lesson, students:

  • Explore the underlying psychology behind our moral values and beliefs.

  • Examine how morality develops and why it differs across cultures and individuals.

  • Reflect on their core values, how their values influence the issues they care about, and what life experiences influenced their values and beliefs

In this lesson, students:

  • Explore the differences between a growth and fixed mindset.

  • Discover the value of intellectual humility: the ability to recognize the limits of our knowledge.

  • Gain a set of practical techniques to move away from binary thinking towards nuance and complexity.

In this lesson, students:

  • Explore five benefits of engaging with diverse perspectives.

  • Hone their skills to determine "when to draw the line" on engaging across differences.

In this lesson, students:

  • Discover misperceptions they have about people who are different from them.

  • Learn and practice five specific techniques for engaging constructively across differences.

In this lesson, students:

  • Examine the role of contempt in our culture and the danger it poses to society.

  • Gain techniques to "break the cycle of contempt."

  • Uncover what leads conversations to be especially toxic in online settings and how they can overcome these challenges.

In this lesson, students:

  • Learn and practice key skills from cognitive behavioral therapy to gain more control of their emotions in the heat of difficult conversations.

In this lesson, students:

  • Gain a set of practical skills to navigate difficult conversations effectively, including setting an intentional goal for conversations, active listening, non-judgmental questioning, moral reframing, and identifying common ground.

  • Learn how to "troubleshoot" difficult conversations when they start to go awry.

4 Peer-to-Peer Conversation Guides

Our optional peer-to-peer conversation guides provide students with the opportunity to practice their skills with a partner. These 45 minute conversations provide accountability, build social connection, and offer students a chance to apply their skills in a live setting. Guides and exercises are included within the program.

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Data-Driven Outcomes

The program brings rigorous psychology research to life in an engaging, practical, and accessible format.

Assessments are embedded within the program to track outcomes. You can view your students' progress and quiz scores from the Instructor Dashboard.

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What People Are Saying

Even though my students still have a lot of disagreements with each other, I have already noticed that they have been able to have constructive discussions with each other, and they are respectful in their disagreement!"

High School Social Studies TeacherNewport High School

I've used the [Perspectives program] for the last four years with my 11th grade high school students. Not only do they appreciate the break from our traditional curriculum, but they really appreciate how [Perspectives] helps them to be more aware of their own beliefs and biases, to actively seek out diverse opinions, as well as how to best engage in disagreements."

High School US History TeacherOak Park Independent School

Even as a strong proponent of public schools, I recognize that they often fail at teaching critical thinking skills in a way that students can apply outside of specific subject areas. The [Perspectives] platform fills in this gap quite well. The [Perspectives] platform, used properly, should be a high-school graduation requirement."

High School English TeacherBelleville West High School

Measurable Impact

Our research-backed solutions have a track record of creating meaningful impact for students — in the classroom, on campus, and across districts.

870+
Institutions
56%
of Learners Improved Communication Across Differences
65%
of Educators Recommend

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Test Drive the Program

Explore the full Perspectives program in "admin mode" to see how your students will experience it, with the added benefit of being able to skip around across lessons.

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Sign Up

Create your free Perspectives account today to begin fostering constructive dialogue in your classroom!

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