Activities as part of a dialogue process

How to Ensure Learning

When including activities in your dialogue, be clear about the purpose of doing the activity with your group and how learning happens through the activity.

Activities serve as catalysts for reflection and learning within a dialogue process. They can spotlight specific skills or group dynamics, which participants can explore further during dialogue.

This process has the potential to deepen participants’ dialogue skills and foster attitudes that support and enhance meaningful exchange.

While activities are valuable tools in the dialogue process, primary learning occurs through open, free-flowing discussions, where participants develop their skills through direct, authentic communication with one another.

    • Why is that activity useful for your group?

    • How does that tool fit in your group’s process?

    • What learning do you hope to achieve with the activity?

    There should always be a specific purpose for the activity, either related to the group process, dynamics, or the goals of dialogue.

    For you to be able to make this assessment, you need to know what is the learning goal of the activity, and how you as a facilitator ensure the activity and its implementation supports learning.

    • Remember your role as a facilitator - guiding the groups through that activity vs. teaching the group through the activity

    • You are also trying to facilitate the group’s learning with the activity, not sharing what the expected learning outcome should be for them.

    • Leave ample time for reflection and discussion to enable the group to connect the activity to their dialogue process.

  • What to keep in mind when facilitating activities?

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DIALOGUE AGREEMENTS

ACTIVITY OBJECTIVE

The following list includes some of the recommended agreements that groups should adopt to ensure a healthy and constructive dialogue. It is recommended to adopt those agreements as a group and ask every participant to confirm that they adhere to them. In addition to the list below, it can be helpful to solicit ideas from the group on additional agreements.

    1. Participation: Be present, engaged, and come on time to the sessions.

    2. Respectful exchange: Take collective responsibility for the group to have a respectful exchange. No verbal violence. Refrain from interrupting and focus on listening. Take care of yourself and each other. Also, refrain from making broad generalizations about a given group.

    3. Authenticity: Speak openly & honestly. 

    4. I-statements: be aware of your assumptions that others have had the same experience as you. Speak from your own experience. 

    5. Non-judgment: Avoid getting personal if you don’t agree with someone. If someone hurts or offends you, name the action rather than “writing the person off”.

    6. Inquiry: Ask questions out of curiosity, and not to prove a point.

    7. Confidentiality: In order for group members to feel comfortable sharing honestly, it is important that we have an agreement about respecting one another’s privacy.

ICEBERG ACTIVITY

ACTIVITY OBJECTIVE

The iceberg activity is a great tool to help participants become more aware of their own and others’ thought process. A facilitator may also reference the image later to help the group have more productive conversations, particularly when they are struggling to listen to each other, or they are embroiled in conflict.

  • The facilitator can use the iceberg metaphor to promote group reflection. What participants say or do is above the water, but why they believe or do so is below the surface.

    Dialogue is a way to learn about what lies underneath the surface for ourselves and another person.

    When we interact with others, particularly when we are in conflict with them, we see only their positions and conclusions. This concept is very helpful in conflict resolution because we need to ensure that each party’s basic needs are addressed in order to find solutions or even common ground.

    The facilitator can also use the metaphor of an iceberg to gain insights into culture. Underneath what is immediately obvious to an outside observer (language, dress, rituals, etc.) there may be an unseen world of values, beliefs, history, etc. that may explain the outward manifestations of
    culture.

I-STATEMENTS

ACTIVITY OBJECTIVE

This activity introduces I-Statements as an effective tool for communicating and expressing our emotions and underlying needs constructively, helping participants move toward respectful interactions..

  • After practicing active listening, the participants can think about how they express themselves in situations where there might be disagreement or conflict. The facilitator can ask eliciting questions on I-statements and experiences from the group around using I-statements.


    The group can think of a time when they engaged in conflict with someone else and if they used I-statements to work it out. The thoughts sharing can be around using I-Statements in this example. We are more likely to promote a positive ongoing relationship with the other person and get our needs met when we are able to identify and express our emotions and our underlying needs in a situation, rather than making an accusation or a demand.

    Here is the format for an I-statement:

    “When ___happens___, I feel ___x emotion____, because ____y context____. I’m hoping in the future we can ___z solution____.”

    We rarely keep to such an exact format in “real life”, but this format can help us to identify

    1. The interaction that caused
    the emotion;

    2. The core emotion we are feeling;

    3. The personal context and history for why the emotions occur;

    4. A suggestion on how to move forward together.