Facilitation Techniques and Workshop Activities | Library

Free Time

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To explore how it feels to be excluded—and to be excluding.

This exercise deals with the importance of unlearning. The facilitator gives instructions to cover one of your ears or eyes. Later, the facilitator refers to the left ear as nose and the right eye as mouth. Subsequent instructions slow down your performance.

Social Virus

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We all know how quickly the cold or flu can spread through the office, but we don't often think about how contagious our emotions can be. This exercise provides a brief simulation of how quickly both negative and positive emotions can be transmitted. One participant is selected to be the Negative Infector General and asked to infect others with a negative emotion. During the next round, you pretend to select another participant to be the Positive Infector General. At the end of the second round, participants are surprised to find out that they became more positive even though no one initiated the emotion.

What Do You Do?

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I dread the moment when people ask me, “What do you do?” I don't know how to explain that I am a performance technologist, or an instructional designer, or a facilitator. So I cheat by saying that I am a trainer.

Here's an activity that helps you become more fluent in explaining what you do for a living.

THE IDEA VAULT

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You have a wealth of brilliant ideas, and it can be a challenge to select which to take forward to develop further.

This game will help you decide on, and select winning ideas.

Rapid Responses

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Here's an experiential introduction to this activity:

What is your preferred technique for learning something new?

Write your answer on a piece of paper. If you don't have a piece of paper, just say your answer out aloud.

I am now going to ask you a different question. Once again, write down your answer (or say it out aloud).

What method do you usually use to train other people?

Compare your answers to the two questions. Are they consistent with each other? If not, why is there a discrepancy between the way you like to learn and the way you train others? Should you not help others learn the same way you like to learn?

Does this inconsistency exist because you believe that training is different from learning? Don't you believe that training has to result in learning?

Does this inconsistency exist because you believe that your learning preference is unique only to you? Don't you think that other people may have unique learning preferences? How does your training accommodate these individual differences?

Break-out Room Tag

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Everyone plays tag, using breakout rooms in Zoom

Distance Makes The Brain Grow Stronger

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This interesting exercise replicates research done by Evan Polman of New York University and Kyle Emich of Cornell University on construal level theory. You can find more information about this theory by visiting this page in Psychlopedia: http://www.psych-it.com.au/Psychlopedia/article.asp?id=79 The participants work with two different versions of the same problem. One version describes a problem faced by someone else while the other version identifies the problem confronting the reader. The debriefing suggests that it is easier to come up with creative solutions when people are thinking for someone other than themselves.

Little-Known Facts II.

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People enjoy learning little-known facts (LKFs) about each other. (E.g. I have a twin brother / I always need to know which direction North is / etc.). They also enjoy revealing such facts to total strangers--perhaps because it makes them feel like celebrities. In this exercise teams match LKFs with participants.

Make A World

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The Make a World game appeals to visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learners because of its layers of interaction. It’s useful (and downright fun) because it lets players imagine the future and take action to create a first version of it. All successful ventures start with a vision and some small, initial effort toward crystallization. Alexander Graham Bell’s vision for the telephone started as highly rudimentary sketches.

Little Known Facts - I

get-to-know icebreaker thiagi team

People enjoy learning little-known facts (LKFs) about each other. (E.g. I have a twin brother / I always need to know which direction North is / etc.). They also enjoy revealing such facts to total strangers--perhaps because it makes them feel like celebrities. Participants guess LKFs about other people by asking Yes/No questions.

High Performance Pyramid

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Explore some of the important elements and benefits of each of these four dimensions (Physical, Mental, Emotional, and Spiritual).

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