Constructive Dialogue Institute
Perspectives is a blended learning program supplied for all campus affiliates which equips you with practical skills to engage in dialogue across lines of difference.
Perspective’s core principles
- Let go of winning
- Enter conversations with curiosity and the goal to understand
- Get curious
- Ask questions that invite others to share something meaningful
- Share stories
- Share a story about why an issue matters to you or how it affects you
- Navigate conflict with purpose
- Be aware of your fight/flight response and pause if needed before responding
- Find what’s shared
- Finding similarities can help you move forward together, even in disagreement
Perspectives Lessons (from the Constructive Dialogue Institute website):
- Lesson 1 (“The Divided Mind”)covers foundational concepts from psychology about how we process information, cognitive biases we are prone to, and how this can lead to disagreements.
- Lesson 2 (“Us and Them”) explores the psychology of where our differences in values and worldviews come from. It offers frameworks for better understanding opposing views.
- Lesson 3 (“Get Curious”) teaches the first two CDI principles of constructive dialogue: let go of winning and get curious.
- Lesson 4 (“Storytelling”) describes how to put CDI’s third principle of constructive dialogue into practice – share stories.
- Lesson 5 (“Navigating Conflict”) introduces students to the fourth principle of constructive dialogue – navigate conflict with purpose – as a way to help move forward when tension arises.
- Lesson 6 (“Moving Forward Together”) explains the importance of the fifth principle for constructive dialogue: find what’s shared.
- CDI Resources
- Interested in taking the course email eepps@binghamton.edu.