Embed engaging strategies throughout the learning or meeting experience you are planning. Engaging strategies offer opportunities for participants to more fully grasp the content and to connect learning to their own contexts.
Individual and collective learning is supported by intentionally chosen strategies and activities with sequenced steps that suit your group’s current goals, incorporating the focal constructs of transformative SEL in real time. Build in a balance of interactive and reflective experiences that vary in complexity and style, to meet the needs of all participants and your intended outcomes for the time together.
An engaging strategy can be:
- An activity that enhances individual learning or collective learning.
- A strategy for quickly pairing participants with a variety of partners for reflection and discussion.
- A routine that offers individual think-time.
- A ritual that supports individual or group processing that is used on a regular basis.
Brain breaks are an important subgroup of engagement strategies that anchor current learning and prepare the mind and body for new learning. These often are kinesthetic or reflective in nature.
A brain break can be:
- A transition routine.
- A calming activity that promotes focus and readiness to learn.
- An opportunity for agency, if participants are invited to lead the group in a movement activity of their choosing, at the time they feel it’s right for a brief break.
Examples
Collaborate to sort, match, or sequence cards with content/information that is generated by participants. Card sorts help keep groups focused as they narrow large brainstorms down into key concept categories in the problem solving process.
Read moreIn this pairing activity, each person has their own copy of a “Clock Buddies” handout and enters the name of a fellow participant on each of the corresponding slots. These will become partners for various activities throughout the engagement.
Read moreA silent raised hand brings the group’s attention back to the facilitator after an engaging activity done in pairs or small groups.
Read moreEveryone has time to think silently about a topic before discussing it with a partner. Partners then discuss the topic in a group of four before sharing insights and new knowledge with the whole group.
Read moreThis protocol offers a structured and condensed way to engage with data, with a focus on reflecting on implications and developing next steps.
Read moreParticipants are divided into two groups that are seated in concentric circles, all facing the center. The outside circle listens while the inside group has a discussion about a topic. Then the groups switch places so the listeners become the speakers.
Read moreLike viewers at a gallery, individuals or small groups of participants rotate from poster to poster, stopping to view, discuss, and add ideas at each station.
Read moreParticipants reflect, and share new ideas while building community in a high energy protocol.
Read moreSmall groups each discuss a different excerpt of an article or topic. Groups then reorganize so that each new group contains one member from each of the original groups. The members of the new group now "teach" their excerpt to the members of their new group.
Read moreActing as a maître d', the facilitator calls participants to form "tables” where they "dine" (exchange ideas) with a variety of tablemates.
Read moreParticipants reflect on a prompt, and then write and silently share their ideas with one another.
Read moreAfter reading a text or viewing a video participants follow a protocol to share and discuss their responses in a small group. The structure ensures that everyone has an opportunity to interact with new information and share their thinking without entering into a dialogue.
Read moreAn energizing activity that involves movement, examining feelings of frustration, and discussing how we respond to challenges.
Read moreWhen preparing to learn something new, participants reflect on metacognitive questions to consider what they are curious about and how the topic is relevant to their experience.
Read moreParticipants make sculptures with Play-Doh, then combine their sculpture with a partner's, then finally create a combined sculpture with a group of 4.
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