Published on: 23/11/2011
Introductory or ‘setting the scene’ exercises
Setting the scene is essential to creating a safe and facilitative learning environment in which learners’ feel comfortable to participate and learn from the course, and to take responsibility for their role as learners.
Regardless of the exercises used, it will be a good idea to explore the following questions in the introductory session:
- What are learners bringing to the workshop? This could include questions/ concerns/ experience/ skills/ expectations and so on.
- What are they missing out on by attending?
- What are their hopes and fears for the training?
- What kind of training environment do they want to create that will help them to participate freely and learn best? This gives the trainer some ground-rules for the workshop, which should be placed somewhere easily visible throughout the training. Examples of ground-rules include talking one at a time, keeping cellular phones off during sessions; respect everyone’s views, no undermining each other, punctuality, and so on.
- It may also be a good idea to introduce the 'parking lot' idea here, or a place for capturing issues, concerns or questions raised by learners that are important, but not directly relevant to the session or module being covered. It’s important that the trainer follows up on these ‘parking lot’ issues, expectations or questions from the learners.
- Overall purpose of and background to the training - how and why it came about and the broad objectives to be achieved by the end of the training.
- How the training is structured and logistics in terms of session times, days, meals, breaks, and so on.
- Presentation of the workshop or session objectives and agenda, which should be linked to the learners’ expectations
Some examples of introductory activities
- Learners introduce themselves one after the other by selecting an adjective that starts with the first letter of their name and describes something about them.
- Learners walk around to find an object from the environment that represents what they are bringing to the workshop. They then present the item while introducing themselves and tell the participant group:
- What they are bringing to the workshop.
- What they want out of the workshop.
- What they are missing by being at the workshop.
- Learners are asked to stand up and to move into groups according to the following example instructions. After each grouping, ask the learners to introduce themselves to the person on their right and the person on their left:
- Move all the men on the left and the women on the right
- Ask the learners to group themselves according to the areas they come from
- Ask the learners to group themselves according to the colour of their shirts or shoes
Plenary exercises
- Quick collective brainstorming on a particular question or issue. The trainer captures the main points made by learners during the brainstorm on a flipchart and then facilitates a discussion.
- Quick collective free association to an idea or concept, where the learners say what immediately comes to mind and the trainer writes these words or phrases on the flipchart and then facilitates a discussion or gives further input on the ideas or concepts.
- Learners write their ideas or opinions on half A4 cards, one idea per card, and put them on a wall, then discuss in plenary.
- The learners find a partner and discuss or practice or consider a particular idea, concept or case study.
- Learners work in buzz groups of 3’s or 4’s and then report their main ideas to the big group for further discussion based on these report backs.
- Remember also that people can learn by reflecting on their own experiences, distilling the main ideas and then generalizing and applying these ideas to the issue being discussed. This can also happen in small groups.
- On the whole, it’s better to use small groups of no more than eight learners for most exercises as this ensures that all learners have an opportunity to speak and share their ideas, opinions and experiences.
Brainstorming
Brainstorming means giving free reign to the imagination by drawing out as many ideas about a topic as possible in a given time. There are no rights or wrongs and no judgement is placed on any comments. Brainstorming allows individuals and groups to try to capture all possible ideas or perspectives on a given topic within a given (usually short) amount of time. The outputs are the ideas, thoughts, questions, etc. that are documented preferably visibly on a flipchart so that the learners can interact with them as food for further ideas.
General rules
- Do not judge or criticise any ideas.
- Let ideas flow – be imaginative.
- Free wheel – build on other people’s ideas.
- Go for quantity, not for quality.
- Clarify items. Expand on an idea without evaluating it.
- Record all ideas, no matter how trivial it might seem.
- As soon as all ideas have been listed, assess and evaluate them openly in a facilitated discussion with all brainstorm learners.
Using PowerPoint presentations
- It takes on average two to three minutes to explain each slide. Therefore, do not have more than 10–15 slides for a 45-minute presentation.
- Avoid large amounts of text on a slide and do not just read from the slide.
- Put short statements on the slide as headings and reminders to yourself about what to say and in what order.
- Avoid colours that are difficult to read, such as red and yellow.
- Most importantly, check the slides yourself from where the learners will be sitting to see whether they are readable.
- Use of images and illustrations often is clearer than use of text
For more PowerPoint tips and tools visit: www.knowwiththeflow.org
