<p>Interested in knowing which schools use the Harkness Table or similar student focused learning efforts in the Humanities /History/Engish. etc?</p>
<p>I know Exeter does.</p>
<p>Thanks for your help in advance.</p>
<p>I know: SPS, Choate, NMH, Berkshire, Taft?, Andover, and yeah maybe Tabor or something :p</p>
<p>check this
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/492744-schools-use-harkness-method.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/492744-schools-use-harkness-method.html</a></p>
<p>Scroll down your page and you’re able to see similar threads that might answer your question.</p>
<p>At Lawrenceville they made always made a big deal about the fact that they were using them.</p>
<p>Almost every school we toured 2 years ago and this year uses some kind of Harkness or similar method. Sometimes it is in all humanities classes, sometimes it is “pure” Harkness, sometimes just teacher by teacher. Sometimes they don’t use a “table” but still have a similar type discussion format.<br>
In my opinion, I think the Harness method is over-hyped. Teachers know that they need to engage students.</p>
<p>Harkness has been around for thousands of years. It’s called the Socratic method.</p>
<p>St. Andrew’s School uses them for most classes.</p>
<p>Most schools use the Harkness table. I know Middlesex does.</p>
<p>We got tired of hearing about it on our tours–it’s become a buzzword of sorts without much meaning. What you really want to understand is class size, teacher availability, individual student attention, breadth of classes and whether the school is a good fit for your D/S on other levels.</p>
<p>shrlyhe,</p>
<p>I think Middlesex uses the Socratic method rather than the Harkness table.</p>
<p>yeah pretty much everywhere uses it for english/history</p>
<p>My tour guide said that they use the Harkness table.</p>
<p>*shrlyhe,</p>
<p>I think Middlesex uses the Socratic method rather than the Harkness table. *</p>
<p>These are two different things. A Harkness table is just an oval, physical table that one sits at. The Socratic method is an educational technique (most often used in law school these days) in which questions are asked of students more often than information is provided. There’s no reason that one can’t use the Socratic method to teach students who happen to be seated around a Harkness table.</p>
<p>A ton of schools do, but didn’t some Exeter person invent it and no one else calls it Harkness?</p>
<p>It was created by Exeter faculty [Harkness</a> Tables](<a href=“http://www.harknesstable.com/about.html]Harkness”>http://www.harknesstable.com/about.html)</p>
<p>There is a business that sells Harkness tables, and only schools that use Harkness tables are allowed to use the word Harkness. These are the schools [Harkness</a> Tables](<a href=“http://www.harknesstable.com/clients.html]Harkness”>http://www.harknesstable.com/clients.html)</p>
<p>The Harkness method is the socratic method of teaching [Socratic</a> method - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_method]Socratic”>Socratic method - Wikipedia), and any school can use the socratic method. At independent schools with small class sizes, some type of table or circular location of desks is used to facilitate discussion, typically in humanities or social science classes.</p>
<p>My understanding is that at Exeter, even math is taught using the Harkness method exclusively. At most schools with Harkness tables or some other configuration that facilitates discussion and discovery through discussion, math and science are often taught lecture, lab and discussion.</p>
<p>Harkness was a very wealthy man who gave a lot of money to many schools for educational purposes. He donated the money to Harvard and Yale for their House and Residential College systems, respectively.</p>
<p>When I was a student at L’ville, math, but not science, was taught around Harkness tables. In fact, science classes were my only classes that didn’t use them. Since then, they have switched math classes to a more traditional arrangement when they built a math/computer building that went into use shortly after I graduated.</p>
<p>i’m surprised that our good friend, winterset, has not joined in to remind us that edward harkness was a st. paul’s school alumnus. and, incidentally, harkness is not as much about teachers engaging students - or teachers asking questions a la the contemporary socratic method - as it is about students engaging in civilized, intelligent, truly respectful discourse among themselves.</p>
<p>At Exeter, there was this video on the website that said students used to snap to get the teacher’s attention.</p>
<p>Harkness is NOT the Socratic method. My sister went there and she says lots of outsiders say that it is, but they are two very distinct things. Harnkess does not consist of just questions, but student discussion that is helped by the Harnkess table, which was configured exactly just so each person is a certain distance from everyone else, vision, etc. Its really complicated.</p>
<p>I stand very much corrected. Thanks to all.</p>