Let's Talk Facilitation

In today's episode of Let's Talk Facilitation, I share with you my top five strategies for building real community in class. In last week’s episode, I talked about the importance of students experiencing belonging as a central factor in their willingness (or lack thereof) to engage in your class, and I talked in detail about how to position the cultivation of belonging as a cornerstone of your pedagogy. How do we inspire feelings of belonging? Through community building. Today I am following up with the concrete, tangible, practical steps you can take to build community in your class. If you have been struggling to get your students to do the work, to show up to class, and to participate in your discussions and activities, you are going to want to listen to last week’s and this week’s episodes! My top five community-building strategies share a number of qualities in common. They all… Center opportunities for meaningful relationship building Are humanizing Allow you and your students to see one another as real people Provide space for building genuine connections Provide support for vulnerability, which is key to developing trust Here’s what these strategies don’t do: They don’t… Involve silly games Force impersonal activities Keep everything surface level Require a performance Privilege small talk Make shy students miserable Instead, the practices I’m talking about are purposeful and strategic. They are designed to support the kind of relationships that enable students to show up to class and be valued as their authentic selves. Enjoy!   FREE BONUSES In today's episode, I talk about establishing and using group norms as part of the process of building community in your class. If you’d like some ideas of how such group norms might be described, you can download a copy of my FREE PDFs “Sample Class Discussion Guidelines Statement” and “Sample Anti-Racist Discussion Guidelines Statement”.

If you are like most college educators in the U.S. who have been teaching during the pandemic, you're experiencing a very particular challenge when it comes to teaching your classes: Students aren’t showing up! The lack of recent student engagement has educators feeling helpless and stuck. They are asking: What do I do when my students aren’t doing any of the work? How do I respond to the students who do complete their work, but who submit it at the last minute, and clearly didn’t pay attention to what the assignment asked of them? What do I do about the record number of students at risk of failing my class? How do I deal with all the students who don’t show up??? As an educator devoted to helping other college educators to become outstanding class facilitators, I find myself therefore asking: How can we get more students to show up to class, pay attention, and do the work, so that facilitating a meaningful classroom experience is even possible? Few things in life have a single, simple solution. But this one, my friends, I am pleased to report... does. That's right. I believe there is one single factor that determines whether or not your students are likely to show up and engage.  In today’s episode of Let’s Talk Facilitation, I share with you a powerful factor–the number one most vital factor–you must have if there is any hope for getting your students to show up and engage enthusiastically with your activities. If you're among the countless educators who have been experiencing lower-than-usual student engagement, you’re not going to want to miss this one! FREE BONUS Want more ideas for inspiring students to participate in class? Get your free copy of the PDF "Ten Powerful Tools to Get Your Students Excited to Talk in Class." Download your copy here!

In today's episode I talk about the unsustainable amounts of work and inadequate compensation weighing down many college educators, resulting in burn out and a mass exodus of faculty leaving academia across the U.S. I share with you a strategy I've honed for saving tons of time on class preparation. Not only does this strategy save time, but it can make the discussions we lead even better as well. Time-saving hacks are not the same as dismantling the capitalist system. But we need to save up our energy in the short term in order to persevere for the longer fight. Hopefully today’s episode will help towards that goal. In addition to my time-saving strategy, I also offer a few hard won lessons about taking care of yourself as best you can when your labor conditions are dehumanizing and you haven’t yet found a feasible opportunity to leave. Some of those lessons include… Getting yourself an advocate. Learning to say “no.” Remembering you may love your job, but your job does not love you back.  Setting clear work times and off duty times if you work from home. I hope this episode provides you a bit of relief. FREE BONUS Want a copy of the class agenda template that I reference in today's episode? Get your free PDF "Sample Class Facilitation Agenda Template" and save yourself tons of time on class prep! Get your free copy here!

When the Covid19 pandemic hit, were you among the majority of college educators who had to make an abrupt switch to teaching online? Despite how many educators began teaching through Zoom and other online meeting platforms, very few ever received formal training in remote pedagogy. Most were simply thrown into the deep end and forced to figure out how to swim on their own. As a result, many attempted to recreate an in-person experience through an online platform, and were not satisfied with the results. Today, I address two of the biggest challenges that facilitators struggle with when making the switch from an in-person to an online environment: Creating an equitable opportunity for everyone to participate Figuring out how to “read the room” I share with you exactly what to do to get your students interacting and using their voices during your remote discussion, so you don’t have to be stuck with the frustration of talking to yourself in front of a bunch of empty screens. I also give you a step-by-step game plan for deciphering students’ level of understanding, interest, mood and other important information that students often communicate through nonverbal cues that can be challenging to pick up over the computer. By the end of this episode you are going to have specific tools to get all of this same information from your students over zoom that you are used to gathering in person, with a new and effective set of online adaptations. I also share some tips about what to do when, despite all your best efforts, students just don’t want to engage. FREE BONUS Don't have a pen and paper handy while listening to today's episode? No worries! I've created a simple checklist of all of the strategies covered today in a FREE PDF you can download to keep on hand for later. Get your free copy of my "Checklist: Online Engagement Plan" here!

Of all the challenges teachers say they struggle with, trying to facilitate a discussion when students aren’t engaging–or aren’t engaging meaningfully–seems to come up the most often. One of the most common reasons students are hesitant to share their ideas in class is because they are worried that what they have to say is “wrong.” In other words, they think that to participate effectively in class discussion they are supposed to answer the teacher’s questions correctly. They don’t actually understand what is expected of them as a participant in a purposeful discussion, dialogue, or debate. They are intimidated by a process that doesn’t make sense to them. In today’s episode of Let’s Talk Facilitation, I talk about why some students are confused about their role in class discussions and how exactly to support them to speak up, and to speak up effectively. So grab your pen and paper, pop in your ear buds, and get ready to make a plan with the concrete steps I offer to inspire more engagement in your classes. FREE BONUS Want more ideas for inspiring students to participate in class? Get your free copy of the PDF The Ultimate Quickstart Guide to Getting Students to Talk. Download your copy here!

Whether you are outgoing, shy, or “it’s complicated,” when we find something we are excited about and in the mood to talk about and we get into the zone… any one of us can go on and on and on! There is nothing more fun (if I do say so myself) than talking at length about a subject you care deep;y about, especially when you are with others who also share your enthusiasm. And there are certainly times, in the classroom included, when you should be in the spotlight, pontificating and storytelling and musing at length so that others can learn from your expertise and insights. But there are other times, especially during class discussions, when the students are better served by your measured guidance and active listening–not so much your prolific speaking. When the facilitator talks too much, it eats up time that students could otherwise be speaking. It can intimidate certain students who worry their contributions could never equal your own and so it can therefore discourage some students from speaking up even when the floor is open to them. And when you speak too much, it can actually derail the discussion–focusing attention on you and where you want the discussion to go, not necessarily on what is piquing the interests of the students and what they are wanting to explore. In other words, when you talk too much, you risk interfering with your students’ learning. So how do you step back and let go a bit as a facilitator? In today’s episode of Let’s Talk Facilitation, I have a heart-to-heart with my listeners who struggle with finding the right balance of talking, guiding, and listening in their classes. I share three mistakes overly talkative facilitators make that inadvertently shut down conversation, and what you can do instead. Of all the problems facilitators have to work through, and as challenging as this may be for some, learning to step back is a pretty great place to be working from. After all, it means you are super enthusiastic about what you are teaching! And that’s a wonderful gift for your students. Today, I’ll just help you finesse it. FREE BONUS! Want even more ideas for inspiring meaningful engagement in you classes? Be sure to check out my free PDF, The Ultimate Quickstart Guide to Getting Students to Talk, for additional strategies you can implement right away. Get your free copy: The Ultimate Quickstart Guide to Getting Students to Talk

What do you do when you’ve worked hard to get everything ready for your class to have an amazing discussion–picking out interesting readings, creating provocative discussion prompts, making a plan for leading interactive activities to engage those questions about the readings–and then you get to class only to discover… Many of the students HAVEN’T EVEN DONE THE READING, so there is no way for them to participate well, if at all!In today’s episode I share a series of pedagogically sound approaches to encourage students to do the readings and be ready to participate in class discussions–no begging or threatening needed! At the end of the day, students are their own people and will make their own choices–it isn’t our place to force anyone to do anything. And with the covid19 pandemic still underway, a lot of people–our students and us–are exhausted, stressed out, or grieving. Cutting everyone a little extra slack (and coming prepared with a plan b if students just haven’t done the readings) can go a long way. But to provide the greatest opportunity and increase the likelihood that students who have the capacity to do the reading actually make the effort to do so, you can make some specific, concrete choices in how you run your class. Check out the strategies I offer today and try them out. You just might get more engagement than before! FREE BONUS! Want even more ideas for getting more students to speak up? Be sure to check out my free PDF, The Ultimate Quickstart Guide to Getting Students to Talk, for additional strategies you can implement right away. Get your free copy: The Ultimate Quickstart Guide to Getting Students to Talk

Picture it: You’re teaching a discussion-based class. It could be anything–a first year seminar, an intermediate tutorial for majors, a capstone group–whatever. You’ve got a certain amount of material to cover and have worked hard to create an agenda that, if you can get the timing right, will help the group arrive at the biggest take-aways by the end of the class period. Despite your best efforts to keep everyone engaged and on track, there are a few students who often shift the discussion off topic and derail the class. With each anecdote, rumination, or pontification they offer, the group is carried further and further away from the agenda you so carefully crafted. Each time one of them starts up on another tangent, you can feel your own frustration and exasperation setting in. You struggle with how to welcome their input but also shut down these unproductive side quests. Sound familiar? Keeping a discussion on track is one of the biggest challenges facilitators share with me. Maintaining focus can often be challenging because kind-hearted facilitators who want to make space for all of their students to learn, aren’t always sure of how to find an effective balance between welcoming everyone’s contributions and limiting contributions that take away from the discussion goals. In today’s episode of Let’s Talk Facilitation, I share five simple, practical, and effective tools to stop one or several talkative students from derailing the group. Just think about how good it will feel–and how much time you will save and stress you will avoid–when you’ve figured out how to nip this problem in the bud!

Even experienced educators who consider themselves decent discussion facilitators can get stressed out during difficult discussions, and are always looking for ways to improve their skills. In today’s episode, I focus on the kind of discussions that are difficult because a class is talking about injustice of some kind, and privileged students and facilitators (unknowingly or not) perpetuate the injustice through their means of engagement. This oppressive behavior creates conflict, as the students (or facilitators) who are targeted by the injustice are forced to defend themselves against harm or disengage. It might be tempting to say that the “difficulty” lies in everyone’s experience of the conflict, but that isn’t so. Such conflict may be “difficult” for privileged facilitators and students who are uncomfortable as they figure out how to navigate through a process of preventing or resolving the conflict. But for the students or facilitators who are targeted by the injustice, the conflict isn’t simply “difficult.” It can be traumatic. So while everyone in a discussion has the ability and potential to contribute in ways that positively influence the dynamics of a group, those with relative privilege carry a great deal of the responsibility for doing so. Despite a commitment to creating classroom spaces that disrupt unjust patterns and that inspire transformative change, facilitators can still find it daunting when such difficulties emerge. And it can be equally challenging to know how to respond effectively to students when that happens. So in today’s episode I talk about how to respond effectively to students during difficult discussions, and I share five concrete strategies for what you can do when you–particularly as a facilitator with comparably more privilege than your students–feel overwhelmed.   FREE BONUS! At the end of the episode, I share information about a free PDF I created for you which includes the text of class discussion guidelines I wrote and have used on a number of my course syllabi to set the stage for the responsibilities students have towards one another. If you would like an idea of how you might word your own such statement, feel free to copy mine in its entirety, or revise and adapt it for your own needs. Get your free copy: Sample Community Guidelines Statement

What do you do when you’re passionate about teaching for justice, but your students are just not there for it? If you’ve ever wrestled with how to bridge the gap between your radical ambitions and your students’ more conservative inclinations, today’s episode of Let’s Talk Facilitation is for you! In it, I share with you the go-to strategies you can use in discussions with students who would rather simply be told what they need to know, take the test or write the paper, get a good grade, and get out. You know–not be so… political. I also provide a quick overview of “critical pedagogy” so everyone, whether seasoned practitioners or interested beginners have a way to tap into this discussion and find a first step. FREE BONUS! At the end of the episode, I share information about a free PDF I put together for you which includes a list of sample problem-posing questions with examples of how those questions could be adapted to address different topics. Check it out and grow your toolkit for transformative teaching! Get your free copy: Sample Problem-Posing Questions