Students’ perceptions of inclusion in whole-class talk: Critical Collaborative Dialogue as a design for inclusive classroom discussion

This article examines how students perceived inclusion during a six-week implementation of Critical Collaborative Dialogue (CCD) in an Australian Year 5/6 classroom. Drawing on students’ post-discussion interview and focus group data, the analysis characterises how inclusion was experienced when whole-class talk felt open to diverse contributions, safer to enter, and consequential for the direction of inquiry. Students contrasted these experiences with their ordinary experiences of classroom discussion, describing more willingness and confidence to contribute, greater ownership of the discussion, and a stronger sense that ideas influenced where the inquiry was going. They associated these conditions with increased agency, confidence, and relevance. By specifying inclusion as students experienced it in practice, this paper refines accounts of dialogic pedagogy and offers actionable guidance for planning whole-class talk so that participation feels fair, shared, and intellectually serious.