Workshop Organisation - 5 key aspects
Logistical aspects Contextualisation Making Dreams come
True The Professional Aspects Drawing up the Agenda/Programme
Logistical Aspects
In preparing for the Logistical aspects of a Workshop you have to think about four
things:
Contracts
|
Negotiated Terms of Reference |
Administrative Support
|
Timetabling; Invitations; Clerical & Purchasing Assistance |
The Venue
|
Utilities, furniture, equipment |
Materials and Equipment
|
For preparation & for workshops |
Contracts
Someone will have called for the training to be done. It is useful to know what they
are expecting of the trainer. Are they expecting research, materials production, running
workshops and/or follow up? What time frame is being considered? How much money is
available to produce materials, pay for workshop costs and participants feeding and travel
costs and to pay the trainer?
It is useful to negotiate the trainer's Terms of Reference (ToR) which set out in some
detail exactly what the trainer is expected to do and/or produce, to what standard, by
when, and at what cost.
Administrative Support
If the trainer is external to the organisation then she will need to know how much
administrative support she can expect.
 | Who can she call upon for day to day advice and support? |
| Who is responsible for setting the timetable of events and for sending invitations? |
| Who deals with feeding and accommodation and with reimbursing travelling expenses of
participants? |
| Is clerical support available and if so how much and from whom eg stationery supplies,
typing, photocopying, collating and binding, purchasing materials and equipment needed for
workshops? |
The Venue
The training will take place in a building. Some buildings are more appropriate than
others. Here is a checklist of things to think about:
Heating
|
does it exist & who is responsible for turning it on? |
Lighting
|
is this adequate and are there blackout facilities if you need to show a
film? |
Electricity
|
where are the sockets, will you need an extension cable and adapter? |
Furniture
|
are there enough chairs and tables and is it OK to shift them around? |
Walls
|
is it OK to stick things on the walls or will you have to bring flip chart
stands? |
Equipment
|
what equipment is available, is it working, are there spare bulbs? TV
aerial? |
Kitchen
|
can food be prepared at the venue (are there cups etc) or will they have
to be brought in? |
Toilets
|
do they exist, are they clean, is there toilet paper, will they be open? |
Access
|
is it easy to find or will participants need a map? Car parking? Disabled
access? |
Materials and Equipment
The materials and equipment that you need will depend on the methods that you use. Some
will be needed for preparation (eg computer, printer & photocopiers) and others during
the workshop itself. No list of these things would ever be complete but here are some
ideas for starters - you can brainstorm and categorise your own checklist! [Check out a
supplier's catalogue for inspiration eg Viking Direct on 0800 424444]
Equipment
|
Materials
|
Blackboard/ Whiteboard
Flip Chart Stand
Overhead projector
Film/ Slide projector
TV/ Video + remotes
Cassette/ CD Players
Sound System + Mikes
Video Camera
Minibus + Driver
|
Chalk (white/coloured) Felt pens (water/ spirit)
Flip Charts
Sellotape/ masking tape
Blutak
Drawing Pins
Post-it pads |
Pens/pencils Rulers/ geometry sets
Calculators
Scissors
Stapler/ staples
Writing paper
Folders/ files |
Overhead Transparencies Slides/ videos/ cassettes
Storage boxes
Attendance register
Expense claim forms |
Top of Page
Logistical aspects Contextualisation
Making Dreams come True The Professional Aspects Drawing up
the Agenda/Programme
Contextualisation
Contextualisation is a fancy word for the process
of making sure that your training programme blends easily and effortlessly into the local
situation.
No two groups of trainees are ever exactly the same so, even if you
have dealt with the topic many times before, your materials will probably need fine tuning
- if only to the extent of being able to give local illustrative examples. The more that
you can demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the details of the local situation the
more the trainees are likely to value what you say.
You may also discover that what the organisers want is not the same as
what the trainees want or what you feel that they really need - so you might have to act
as go-between/ advisor as part of the process of negotiating your Terms of Reference.
If you have good answers to each of the following questions then you
can be confident that you are well contextualised.
What does the Organisation want?
| If there are no official terms of reference are you as the trainer clear about what is
expected of you? If not ask. (See Workshop Organisation - the Logistical Aspects) |
What Administrative Support and Materials are already available?
| Are you on your own or are there people who can help you? |
What do the trainees know?
| Has a needs analysis already been done (eg an output from a previous workshop)? |
| Can you visit some trainees in their workplace to get a better feel for their self
defined training needs. What about their customers? Is serious research required here? |
| Is there a need to brainstorm and conceptually map at the beginning of the workshop? |
What does the trainer know?
| What is the trainer's conceptual map before preparing for the workshop? |
| What reference materials are to be consulted? (Local and National) |
| Are there previous workshop agendas/outputs or research findings? |
| What literature should be addressed? (Written/Electronic; published/grey) |
| What videos & resource materials etc might be consulted |
| What materials are already available within the organisation? |
| Which local 'experts' might be usefully consulted? |
| What is the trainer's conceptual map after preparing for the workshop? |
What are the aims and objectives of the workshop in terms of:
| the desired changes in knowledge, skills and attitudes of the participants, and how will
we know if we have been successful? |
| the concepts developed and recorded and materials produced for use at future workshops
and/or as circulars, exemplars, Newsletter or Journal articles etc |
Have the logistics been attended to?
| Work your way systematically through the logistical aspects at an early stage. |
| Leaving things to the last minute can be very stressful. |
Top of Page
Logistical aspects Contextualisation Making Dreams come
True The Professional Aspects Drawing up the Agenda/Programme
The Effective Trainer - making dreams come true
You gotta have a dream
There is an old Arabic saying that if you do not know where
you are going then any road will take your there.
A good trainer is clear in her mind about what needs to be done
and she knows that she will be doing the right thing.
This means that she will have thought about her aims and
objectives and will have written them down. Sometimes these will have been given to
her (for example if she is leading people towards an SVQ qualification) and sometime she
will have to decide for herself what they are. Even when they are given, however, there is
always the possibility of fine tuning them and sharing them with the learners so that
there can be agreement on exactly what a particular course is trying to achieve.
Note that she will have three different types of objectives:
Head
|
Hand
|
Heart
|
Thinking |
Doing |
Feeling |
Knowledge |
Skills |
Attitudes |
How you gonna make the dream come true?
Being clear about aims and objectives means being clear about her dream. The next task
is to figure out how to make the dream come true. She is doing the
right thing but is she going to do it right?
Muddling through by the seat of your pants might achieve the results sometimes but it
is not a professional way of working. Would you trust a plumber or a brain surgeon that
pottered about unsystematically?
Action planning for a trainer means being systematic about the content, the methods and
the monitoring and assessment techniques that will be used to achieve the aims and
objectives.
There are three things to think about regarding content:
Scope
|
How broad and how deep are you
going to go during this course - is it for pre-school or for university? Who are the
learners and what is their level of experience of the topic? |
Sequence
|
Where to begin and where to go to
next? |
Pace
|
How fast will you move through the
content? |
There are thousands of possible methods but it is useful to think of them as
falling into two broad types:
Teacher centred
|
Learner centred
|
Didactic |
Participatory |
Passive student |
Active student |
eg the Lecture |
eg project work |
When assessment is used to 'grade' students it is a
political tool. When assessment is used to give feedback to the
student (or the tutor) on the extent to which the objectives are being achieved so
that she can improve her performance - then it is a training tool.
All good trainers ensure that learners get a lot of feedback during the course of their
learning - many small but detailed corrections along the way are more useful than one big
and generalised judgement at the end!
Top of Page
Logistical aspects Contextualisation Making Dreams come
True The Professional Aspects Drawing up the Agenda/Programme
The Professional Aspects
In preparing for the professional aspects of a Workshop you have to think about three
things:
| What you intend to do |
|
| Aims & Objectives |
|
| How your are going to do it |
|
| Content, Methods and Materials |
|
| How you will know if you have succeeded |
|
| Monitoring and Evaluation |
|
| AIMS |
A statement of the overall
broad goal(s) |
| OBJECTIVES |
A list of SMART* objectives
pointing to the expected outputs from the workshop - these might involve altered
knowledge, skills or attitudes amongst the participants, and/or specific products |
| CONTENT |
METHODS |
MATERIALS |
| A sequenced list of topics to be covered
with an indication of the amount of time to be spent on each |
A parallel list of methods to be used in
covering the content topics |
A parallel list of materials and services
that will be required for each topic given the number of participants |
| As an aid to
systematic planning it is useful to set out the contents, methods and materials in
parallel rows as shown above. Note that the pattern of content and of methods should be
designed so as to add variety and interest over the period of the Workshop |
| MONITORING &
EVALUATION |
Determine the extent to which
the Workshop is/was successful in achieving its objectives and goals. |
| The pattern of
monitoring and evaluation may take several forms eg formal v informal; open response v
directed questionnaire; during, at the end or some time after the Workshop. There are
theoretical and practical pros and cons related to each of the options. |
* = Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Relevant, Timed
As in most other human affairs, motivation makes a
difference. It is generally believed that participation helps to promote ownership
and thus motivation. Wherever possible and appropriate the participants
should be consulted about the aims and objectives and also possibly on the
contents and methods, and the monitoring and evaluation strategies.
When participants are well motivated it is easier to get them to engage in pre-Workshop
activities by way of preparing themselves to make optimum contributions to the Workshop,
and in post-Workshop activities for consolidation and elaboration.
Top of Page
Logistical aspects Contextualisation Making Dreams come
True The Professional Aspects Drawing up the Agenda/Programme
Drawing up the Agenda/Programme
| People stop paying attention when they feel uninterested, bored, tired or
ignored. Your task is to draw up the training agenda or programme so that none of these
things happen. Ideally the trainees will be all eyes and ears and eager to learn. They
will be heedful, mindful, alert, on the ball, and missing nothing. Barring serious medical
problems (see opposite)) your trainees can be like this if you
| address their felt needs in a manner which suits their learning styles, and |
| build in plenty of variety so that you do not expect them to keep paying attention to a
particular topic, in a particular way for more than 20 minutes at a time. |
We have looked at aims and objectives and learning styles elsewhere so here we will
focus on the idea of building variety into the programme.
The completely wrong way of doing things would be for the trainer to sit rigid in a
chair and talk for four hours in a monotonous and unexcited voice.
Variety can be added by changing the types of activity and by changing the social
arrangements. |
attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder, (ADHD), chronic, neurologically based syndrome characterised
by any or all of three types of behaviour:
| hyperactivity, |
| distractibility, and |
| impulsivity. |
Unlike similar behaviours caused by emotional problems
or anxiety, ADHD does not fluctuate with emotional states. Often diagnosed when a child
begins school, ADHD is usually accompanied by learning difficulties and social
inappropriateness.
Treatment may include medication such as methylphenidate
hydrochloride (Ritalin), which corrects neuro-chemical imbalances in the brain; sugar
intake is no longer considered to be a factor.
Symptoms may decrease after adolescence, although adults
can also have ADHD. |
Changing the Social Arrangements
Trainees can be asked to work on their own for one activity and then in small groups
for another and as part of a whole class discussion after that.
If the members of a small group work well together you can let them get together for
all small group activities. On the other hand you might find it more useful to regroup the
individuals each time there is a small group activity so that everyone gets a chance to
get to know everyone else. A variation on this is to change the group sizes - some
activities might require groups of three and others require groups of five - or whatever.
Sometimes it is useful to ask groups to have a structure eg chairperson, secretary and
rapporteur. You could then make it a rule that individuals are not allowed to occupy the
same role twice in succession. This has the advantage of 'stretching' individuals ie of
forcing them out of the sorts of role in which they feel most comfortable.
Three types of Action
Three types of action relate to the three types of objectives which can be set:
Thinking
|
Doing
|
Feeling
|
Knowledge |
Skills |
Attitudes |
Head |
Hand |
Heart |
| Thinking involves putting on your thinking cap and doing
headwork. It requires you to be rational and logical and to deal with the facts. You will
use your intelligence in a reasonable and sensible manner such that you can be pragmatic.
You might even have to crunch numbers. |
Doing involves thinking on your feet and walking the talk.
You will be practising what you preach. This may involve being creative and artistic so
that you can make it look good and set a mood or so that you can say it with pictures
rather than with words. It may involve using your social skills during activities such as
games and role plays. Or it may involve you in actually making things from raw materials
eg toys for your OOSCC Club. |
Feeling involves giving attention to your attitudes,
opinions, beliefs and values. Are you clear about your passions and phobias, your
prejudices and addictions. How are your points of view influenced by your urges, itches,
cravings and yens. What drives you into a rage and makes you furious. |
18 Categories of Activities
There are three types of action and three basic kinds of social arrangement. These can
be lined up on a matrix to create 9 categories of workshop activity:
| |
Type
of Action |
Thinking
|
Doing
|
Feeling
|
Individual
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
Small Group
|
4 |
5 |
6 |
Whole Class
|
7 |
8 |
9 |
But there is the concept of ETHOS - the idea of co-operative
games where there are no losers. There is a difference between a debate which
forces a win/lose outcome and a discussion which leads to a win/win outcome. So there are
nine possible categories of competitive activities and nine possible categories of
co-operative activities - a total of 18 Categories of Activities.
| ACTIVITY: Put on your creative
thinking cap and come up with examples to put in the eighteen boxes - you can rake around
in your experiential memory, look through this handbook for prompts and/or look in books.
Here are some examples to get you started. |
| If you ask other people to help you but do not tell them what you
are doing and keep the list to yourself then this remains as a competitive individual
thinking activity. |
| If you ask other people to help you, tell them what you are doing,
and then share the results - it becomes a co-operative small group activity. |
| If you get the group organised for systematic research and to
write up the findings for distribution to other people then it is a co-operative small
group doing activity (- and people will have feelings about it!) |
|
Top of Page
Logistical aspects Contextualisation Making Dreams come
True The Professional Aspects Drawing up the Agenda/Programme
| 
