Educator eLearning
Our Educator eLearning platform contains dozens of online modules to enhance educator's civic understanding and skills including Socratic Pedagogy and Teaching Logic and Reasoning. Many of the BRI curricula have introductory courses designed to facilitate the use of these resources in classrooms. Following completion of the modules participants are awarded a digital credential or badge as proof of their achievement.
Available Courses
Content Courses
Presidents and the Constitution
This course provides teachers with a content-driven, yet thematic, course using case studies to explore a specific constitutional theme and historical reasoning skill. Guiding questions and case studies draw connections between events and topics throughout the curriculum and history.
Teaching the 20th Century
This course provides a content driven, yet thematic perspective into the 20th century. It uses case studies to explore a specific historical reasoning skill and constitutional principle(s). Each guiding question and case study will allow you to draw connections between events and topics throughout the curriculum and history.
Votes for Women
In this course, you will have an opportunity to become familiar with the interplay between such governing principles as equality, liberty, justice, and separation of powers on the one hand, and essential civic virtues such as civil discourse, humility, integrity, and responsibility, on the other. Through a variety of reflection activities, you will have opportunities to continue developing the habit of thinking about self-government through the lens of these crucial principles and virtues that can be transferred to your own classroom and your own students.
Pedagogy Courses
Introduction to Socratic Pedagogy
Socratic pedagogy allows students to practice the critical analysis and dialogue skills necessary to supporting and maintaining democratic institutions and self-government. Participants will complete a variety of assignments designed to enhance their skills in developing lessons and the classroom culture that support education for self-governance using key pedagogical principles.
Advanced Socratic Pedagogy
Socratic technique is a continuous practice. No matter how experienced a practitioner is, challenges arise when students engage in dialogue. This course will allow participants to reflect on their own practice while also engaging in common issues that arise within the Socratic classroom. The exploration of such issues helps participants develop stronger observational and diagnostic skills in relation to the Socratic method.
Teaching Logic & Reasoning
The classroom acts as a microcosm of a civic society where the practice of engaging in civil dialogue that respectfully challenges arguments from the point of logic and reason allows students to understand what it means to participate in a free society. Students come to understand how standards of logic can unify and serve as a tool for human connection. This course will provide teachers with additional support in teaching the logic and reasoning skills students require for participation in a Socratic based classroom.
Considering the Source
This course explores the importance of historical interpretation. It will help educators understand the importance of using sources with students for more engaging and successful lessons, provide tools to better know the meaning and use of interpretation in the study of history, and share how different interpretations can change our understanding of the past.
Teaching Historical Reasoning
In this course, you will learn how historians work with historical sources so that you can engage your students in historical reasoning. Explore the historical reasoning skills necessary to learn and teach history. Learn how to use historical reasoning processes while teaching and how to develop students to think like historians.