The Four Steps of the Socratic Method

The classical six-step Socratic method is useful but slow. A more compact four-step version is easier to apply in regular reflection. The four steps are eliciting, clarifying, testing, and deciding. Each step has a particular kind of question.

The true goal of the method is not finding final answers. The goal is the process of disciplined questioning. The reflective practitioner who uses the method regularly becomes independent in their professional thinking.

Why four steps instead of six

The six-step version is more thorough but heavier. The four-step version compresses the same logic into a tighter routine that can be used in a single sitting. For day-to-day reflection, the four-step version usually fits better.

Both versions share the same core idea: depth comes from disciplined questioning, and the discipline is what produces the depth.

A teacher who has both versions available can choose. For a one-off deep dive, the six-step version is better. For weekly reflective practice, the four-step version is better.

Step one: eliciting

Eliciting is bringing out the meaning and detail from a learning situation. The teacher’s question at this step is, “what do you already think at this point?”

The point of eliciting is to surface what the thinker already knows or believes about the topic, before any new analysis. The thinker may not realise they have a position, but they almost always do. The eliciting step makes that position visible.

For a teacher reflecting on their own practice, the question becomes self-directed: “what do I already think about this?” The answer is the starting point. The rest of the method works on that starting point.

A common mistake at this step is to skip it. The teacher rushes into analysis without first surfacing their existing view. The analysis then has nothing to work on, and tends to drift.

Step two: clarifying

Clarifying is getting a better understanding of the components that are creating the situation. The teacher’s question at this step is, “what do you mean by X?”

The X is whatever the thinker said in the eliciting step. Almost always, the original statement contains words or ideas that need to be unpacked. A teacher who said “the class did not engage” needs to clarify: what does engage mean? Did all students fail to engage, or only some? Engaged with what? At what point did the engagement break?

The clarifying step is also where the teacher might examine their own role in the situation. The question becomes: what is my role here, and how does that role affect what I am seeing?

Good clarifying questions have a specific quality: they take a vague claim and make it precise enough to test.

Step three: testing

Testing is checking the proposition against observation, against the views of others, and against evidence. The teacher’s questions at this step include “how does X account for Y?”, “how do you know?”, “why should I believe that?”, and “can this be true?”

This is the step where the method gets serious. The thinker has elicited a position and clarified it. Now they have to test it.

Testing can use several kinds of evidence.

1. Observation. What can the teacher actually see? What did they observe in the lesson? What did the students do?
2. Conversation with others. What does a colleague say? What does the literature say? What does the student say?
3. Logic. Does the position hold up to careful reasoning? Are the supposed connections actually supported by reasoning?

A position that survives the testing step is more solid than one that has not been tested. A position that fails the testing step is a chance to revise. Either outcome is useful.

Step four: deciding

Deciding is the final step. The thinker decides whether the proposition is true and whether it should be accepted or rejected. The teacher’s question at this step is, “can you form a new proposition given what you have just learned?”

The decision is not always the same as the original position. The whole point of the method is that the questioning may change the position. A thinker who started with one view often arrives at a different one.

The decision should be a new proposition that takes into account what has been learned through the previous three steps. It is not a return to the original view, unless the original view has survived the questioning.

A useful test of deciding: can the thinker state the new proposition in one or two clear sentences? If yes, the deciding step has produced something usable. If no, more questioning is needed.

A worked example

A teacher uses the four steps on a recurring problem: students are not finishing assignments.

Eliciting. What do I already think about this? “The students are lazy. They have phones. They do not care about my class.”

Clarifying. What do I mean by “lazy”? In what specific ways are they not finishing? Is it all assignments or only some? What kind of assignments produce the highest finish rates? “Lazy” turns out to mean: they finish quick assignments but not long ones. Long assignments with no breakdown into parts are the worst.

Testing. How does the “lazy” theory account for the fact that some long assignments do get finished? Does the literature support “lazy” as an explanation, or does it talk about cognitive load and task structure? What does a colleague who teaches the same class say? The colleague says her students finish her long assignments because she breaks them into parts with intermediate deadlines.

Deciding. Given what I have learned, the new proposition is: “students do not finish long assignments because the assignments are not structured into parts, and the cognitive load is too high without intermediate steps.” This is a different proposition from the starting one. It points to a specific change.

The four-step method has produced a useful conclusion. The original belief about laziness has been revised based on testing.

The link to Bloom’s taxonomy

The Socratic Method connects closely to Bloom’s taxonomy of learning, which moves from lower-order thinking to higher-order thinking.

The stages of Bloom’s Taxonomy are:

1. Remembering
2. Understanding
3. Applying
4. Analysing
5. Evaluating
6. Creating

Each stage of the Socratic Method maps onto a region of the taxonomy.

Questions about remembering and understanding ask the thinker to describe something: an event, an experience. This is the elicitation step. The thinker is bringing out what they remember and understand about the situation.

Questions about applying and analysing ask the thinker to work with the material. These map to the clarifying and testing steps. The thinker is using their understanding to examine specific components and check them against evidence.

Questions about evaluating and creating ask the thinker to make judgements and produce new propositions. These map to the deciding step. The thinker forms a new proposition that takes into account what they have learned.

A reflective practitioner who runs the four-step Socratic Method is also moving up Bloom’s taxonomy. The questions at each step pull thinking from lower-order to higher-order. The two frameworks reinforce each other.

Flashcard

What are the four steps of the Socratic Method, in order?

Tap to reveal

Answer

Eliciting, clarifying, testing, deciding

Eliciting brings out the existing view (“what do you already think?”). Clarifying unpacks vague claims (“what do you mean by X?”). Testing checks the claim against evidence (“how do you know? how does X account for Y?”). Deciding forms a new proposition based on what has been learned.

Why the four-step version is useful in regular reflection

A teacher who runs the four-step method on one practice episode per week develops sharply over a term. The method is fast enough to fit a busy schedule and structured enough to produce real conclusions.

The discipline of running the four steps in order matters. Skipping eliciting hides the starting view, which is data. Skipping clarifying produces analysis of vague claims, which is unreliable. Skipping testing leaves the original view unchallenged. Skipping deciding leaves the work unresolved.

A teacher who consistently runs all four steps, even briefly, has a reliable engine for reflective practice. A teacher who only runs the steps they enjoy has a partial engine.