Conversation Cafe

Activity

Liberating Structures, Ongoing engagement

Conversation Cafe

Maha Bali

Mia Zamora

Autumm Caines

Engage everyone in exploring and making sense of complex or challenging topics. Ideal for addressing difficult or confusing issues through open, respectful conversation.

Tech needed: Video conferencing, Breakout rooms, Shared online space

Asynchronous

Duration: 5-30 mins

Student preparation: None

Educator preparation: Moderate

ACTIVITY PURPOSE

To create a space where all students can engage in open, respectful, and meaningful conversations about complex or challenging topics. Conversation Café helps participants make sense of difficult issues, build trust, and gain insight into different perspectives through structured rounds of listening and sharing.

USEFUL FOR

Encouraging equitable conversations and perspective-taking. Encouraging constructive listening.

PREPARATION

Prepare a clear prompt or question for the Conversation Café theme.
Provide full instructions to students before starting.
Set up breakout rooms or small group spaces.
Arrange a shared space (like Google Docs or physical paper) for students to take notes during the activity.
Optionally, provide a talking object or explain how speaking turns will be managed.

INSTRUCTIONS

Introduce the activity to your students: explain that the Conversation Cafe is a way for them to engage in open and respectful conversations with their peers. Use the slides template to guide the introduction Conversation Café for Community Building Slides to adapt.
Set ground rules and introduce a theme or topic.
Get students into small groups of 4-5.
Send the small groups into breakout rooms with timed rounds of conversation to ensure everyone has an equal opportunity to participate. Ask them to assign a time keeper who will manage time and a note taker.
Sequence of steps in breakout rooms:
Round 1 (4-5 mins) – ask each student to share what they think, feel or do about the theme or topic.
Round 2 (4-5 mins) – ask each student to share their thoughts and feelings after having listened to everybody in their group.
Round 3 (4-5 mins) – open conversation.
Round 4 (4-5 mins) – each student shares ‘takeaways’.

DURATION

At a minimum: around 16 minutes if you have 4 participants per group, or 20 minutes if you have 5 participants in the group. However, you can increase the time for the ‘open’ round of conversation to 10 minutes instead of 4-5.

ADAPTATIONS AND EXAMPLES

Increase or decrease group size (4–7 participants) based on setting and time.
Extend the open conversation round for deeper dialogue if time allows.
Use symbolic talking objects to enhance respectful listening and turn-taking.
Adapt for in-person or online (using breakout rooms and shared digital notes).
Example uses: exploring complex topics, processing change, building trust, or generating new ideas.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

Breakout rooms and either asking students to record them, or take notes in a shared space like a Google slide or Google doc.

USEFUL RESOURCES

This is a Liberating Structure activity developed by Henri Lipmanowicz and Keith McCandless. Inspired by and adapted from Vicki Robin and Susan Partnow, codevelopers of Conversation Cafés.

Conversation Café for Community Building Slides to adapt
Conversation Café – Liberating structures website.
View Virtual Conversation Cafe description.
What are Liberating Structures?