Introducing Trainerspace

By Jackie Clifford

Over the years I have had the privilege of working with many excellent trainers and facilitators. As a result of this I know the value of collaborative working, sharing experience and using our specific strengths to deliver great learning events for our participants.

Five of us have decided to work together on the Trainerspace project:

Sara Thorpe
Andrew Rea
Traci Edwards
Anne Cannings
Jackie Clifford

We plan to create a range of tools and activities to support trainers in all aspects of analysis, design, delivery and evaluation.

We have just published the first article on our website www.trainerspace.co.uk and more will follow very soon.

Here’s a taster of the first one…

Promoting participation in training

All trainers know that group participation makes for a more successful training session, yet it’s often the aspect that many find most challenging. It can lead to the situation most trainers dread – you ask your group a question, and there is silence; you look around hopefully at the group, and people avert their eyes. Eventually you find yourself answering your own question. So you decide on a little group work – chaos ensues as people spend more time debating what they should be doing or the value of the activity and the eventual output is poor. Afterwards you think that they were a difficult group, and that the session was hard work.

Whenever we hold train the trainer sessions the most frequently asked question is “how can I get more participation in my sessions?” Often those asking have already put group exercises or questions to the group in their session, yet these are often followed by embarrassing silences or half-hearted participation. When working with trainers we’ve found that is not the lack of questions or group activities but the techniques used; the secret is not what you do, but how you do it.

So here are four tried and tested techniques to ensure your participation really takes off:

Clarify the expectation at the beginning
Ask open questions
Use small groups
Set up activities clearly and cleanly

Five of us have decided to work together on the Trainerspace project:

Sara Thorpe
Andrew Rea
Traci Edwards
Anne Cannings
Jackie Clifford

We plan to create a range of tools and activities to support trainers in all aspects of analysis, design, delivery and evaluation.

We have just published the first article on our website www.trainerspace.co.uk and more will follow very soon.

Here’s a taster of the first one…

Promoting participation in training

All trainers know that group participation makes for a more successful training session, yet it’s often the aspect that many find most challenging. It can lead to the situation most trainers dread – you ask your group a question, and there is silence; you look around hopefully at the group, and people avert their eyes. Eventually you find yourself answering your own question. So you decide on a little group work – chaos ensues as people spend more time debating what they should be doing or the value of the activity and the eventual output is poor. Afterwards you think that they were a difficult group, and that the session was hard work.

So here are four tried and tested techniques to ensure your participation really takes off: