The one debate trick that actually saved my book club from falling apart

Last year my book club had 3 meetings in a row where people got heated over character choices and nobody could agree on a discussion direction. I tried this simple timer method where each person gets 5 minutes to talk before we open the floor, and it completely changed our group dynamic. Has anyone else tried setting hard time limits or other rules to keep debates from getting out of hand?

2 comments

2 Comments

sams2513h ago

Wait, doesn't a 5 minute timer just mean people have to rush through their point and not really listen? I've seen this work in meetings but in a book club the whole point is to bounce ideas off each other, not give speeches. When we tried it, the quiet people just waited out their 5 minutes saying nothing, and the loud people packed too many thoughts in. We ditched it after one night and went back to just raising hands and talking freely, which was way more natural.

samf956h ago

Did your group try any kind of talking stick or just the timer? I had a friend who did a book club with a timer and they had the same problem. The quiet people felt pressured to talk even when they had nothing to say, and the loud ones just talked faster. The whole thing felt like a race instead of a conversation. They ended up switching to a system where each person could talk for as long as they wanted, but they had to hold a little rock they brought from the park. That way people actually listened and nobody felt rushed. It worked way better for them.