"In that school, students presented their project first, speaking about what they had done (or thought they had done) and what they had been trying to communicate/express in their work. The rest of the class had to listen to them first, and then respond to the presenter's specific questions. This gives the presenter the kind of feedback they usually want--is this thing working--and gives them a chance to explain the context the reader would need to understand the work."

This is interesting; it has made me think about workshop dynamics a lot today. I can see a way this could be adapted to the workshops with which I'm familiar. The rest of the participants write their first-reading critiques as they go through the manuscript the first time, and give those critiques to the writer at the end of the session, so the writer gets those perspectives, which are helpful in knowing whether one has communicated what one meant to communicate to the uninformed reader. During the critique session itself, they don't bring up any of those critiques; they listen to the writer and then respond with the knowledge of what the writer intended.

Knowledge won't necessarily mean understanding, natch, and most workshops will contain some writers who are never going to be each others' readers. I am completely clueless about whether this would be as valuable to the FB group as it looks to me, but from the outside (culturally WAY outside, I know), it looks thoughtful, kind, and useful.