&mdash; educateria

Clinical Education, Motivational Interviewing, Post-secondary Education, Presentation Skills

waterlily2 2018

What does it take to be a wizard inside and outside the classroom?

1. Get excited

Everything in the world is inherently interesting. And everything in the world can be made incredibly boring. If I’m passionate about what I’m teaching, chances are some of that will rub off. This isn’t necessarily a challenge for new professors – or those teaching a course for the first time. When everything is fresh for both faculty and students, teaching is an adventure. Maybe it’s not so much getting excited about what you are teaching, as staying excited – after five years, ten years, or longer. Exploring new and innovative ways to get learners involved and promote their autonomy over their own learning, and fearlessly interrogating our approaches to course content and the processes of teaching, can help to keep us in that ‘beginner’s mindset’.

2. Overcommunicate

This one is a ‘quick-win’ – not difficult to implement, and has a major impact on students’ experience in a course. Students’ lives, like ours, are complicated, busy, and sometimes chaotic. People don’t always attend to our in-class communications or instructions, and/or email, and/or written (print) communication, and/or online course announcements, and/or classroom handouts. The more channels we can mobilize to share information with our students about upcoming assignments, due dates, key information or course resources, the greater the chance that our message will filter through the “white noise” of multiple, competing pressures and priorities.

3. Respond to student queries ASAP

This follows from Point 2, above. For good or ill, people increasingly expect (and value) prompt replies to their questions or concerns, especially via email. And students seem to equate an instructor’s response time with instructor engagement and caring (‘instructional immediacy’). A speedy reply is not always possible, and email communication can be delicate at times, but I try to live by the “24 hour or less” rule and interestingly, students make particular note of how helpful this responsiveness is to them in their comments on course evaluations.

4. Provide the back-story

I’ve found that when students feel like an assignment, an academic decision, a policy, or a course expectation is unfair or unwelcome, it’s usually because they’re not satisfied that there is a good rationale behind it. The trick is, how to communicate this without coming across as defensive, or worse, officious? I’ve found that the elicit-provide-elicit framework in Motivational Interviewing has been helpful in providing information to students. In short, the framework starts with (a) eliciting the student’s understanding of why they think I am proceeding in a certain way; (b) providing a brief (very brief – not a lecture) explanation from my perspective; (c) elicit the student’s response (“What do you make of that? How does this fit for you?”). Reflective listening is an ancillary skill that helps learners feel heard and understood, and makes sure that I am able to engage with accurate empathy.

5. Don’t work harder than your students

Learning is active. It takes effort, involvement and application. If I’m at the front of the room lecturing and the group is passively listening, who’s working harder? It’s a challenge to create dynamic learning activities that engage students in co-constructing meaning, wrestling with new ideas, and practicing new skills. Admittedly, high quality curriculum design generally takes considerable work at the front end – so perhaps it’s more accurate to say “Don’t work harder than your students in the classroom”.

And yes, highly effective teachers have more than these five habits – but after close to two decades, I have found them a strong foundation and a good starting point. Enjoy the journey!

This post is adapted from a previous post , January, 2015

5 Questions to Foster Learner Engagement

February 25, 2018

How do you want to travel?

Lately I’ve been thinking about individual accountability for engaging in learning, and the delicacy in creating a climate where each person in the room feels as invested in the value and success of the course as the instructor does. This means focusing on the process (how learners decide to engage – or not) as well as the content (syllabus or curriculum).

Courses and workshops represent particular journeys for all participants – teacher included. In general, learning facilitators establish and negotiate the content, pacing, climate and structure throughout the course. And yet, learners themselves decide what and how they will learn. Learning can happen in the absence of teaching, and teaching can happen in the absence of learning. The magic happens when the two come together.

Most workshops and courses typically start off with a conversation about:

Learning outcomes
Course overview or outline
Participants’ learning goals
Learning assessments.

However, it’s equally important for learners to identify how they will contribute. In other words, reflecting on how they will learn and participate, what might hold them back, and what would make it safe to take risks and participate in ways that can feel downright uncomfortable. I think these questions are crucial precursors to the usual content-focused beginning to workshops and courses, because a conversation about process sets the stage for reciprocity and co-engagement in the learning journey.

It comes down to a conversation about how we (both the instructor and the group) collectively intend to make the journey together. From a facilitation perspective, this means starting out by asking questions like:

Are you (learner) coming to this class as a spectator or as a participant?
What are some possible ways into the content that would resonate for you, and how could you amplify these entry points?
What would it take to make you want to step outside your comfort zone?
If you decided to take some risks in the interest of your own ‘deep learning’, how can the group support you?
How will you translate and adapt ideas, knowledge and skills in order to apply them in practice?

It’s not essential that we ask all five questions, and there are a wealth of other questions we could pose. The key is our intentionality in creating time for all participants to reflect on their roles and on the nature of the voyage they will take with you and with one-another.

And the next time I attend a workshop (or a class, meeting, performance, celebration or other opportunity to actively engage), I will be asking myself: “How do I want to travel?”

Stage Presence for Presenters

October 10, 2016

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Find your light

I’ve been collaborating with a colleague who teaches performing arts in putting together a “stage presence” workshop for educators and presenters. Our joint approach was sparked by a hallway conversation a few months ago about how stage and theatre performers have much in common with teachers: both need to foster an immediate, emotional connection with the audience/class, and both need to create and sustain an atmosphere of excitement, engagement and inspiration. In addition, all performers, teachers and presenters occasionally experience equipment malfunctions, bad venues, challenging audiences, and unexpected events. What separates the veterans from the beginners is in how we respond, improvise and model ‘grace under pressure’.

A common axiom among theatre performers is to “find your light”. That is, step out onto the stage and find the spotlight. Lately I’ve been thinking about the implications of metaphorically finding your light. In a classroom or lecture hall there aren’t usually spotlights and curtain calls, and the best educators are more occupied with facilitating students’ learning as opposed to occupying centre stage. So, what does finding your light mean in the context of presentation and teaching skills?

I think that in teaching and presenting, our “light” is our truest, most authentic self. If we can model authenticity in a group, with all of the attendant risk and vulnerability that entails, we encourage others to do the same. It is something of a paradox – approaching a presentation as a conversation versus a performance is the essence of great performance! Theatre ‘works’ when it’s a conversation with the audience (either explicitly in experimental theatre, or implicitly in traditional “never break the fourth wall” approaches). And while acting, by definition, involves assuming a character, great actors fully inhabit their character. All that we teachers/presenters have to do is fully inhabit ourselves.

There is something about stepping up to the front of the room that makes people freeze up. It’s a shame when that happens, because we are most engaged when we encounter others as their real selves. Finding your light is about shining your light – for all to see.

Five Big Questions for Creating Learner Engagement

November 29, 2015

Motivational Interviewing, Presentation Skills

bike flowers

How do you want to travel?

Presentations and workshops are particular journeys for all participants – the facilitator included. From an overall accountability perspective, responsibility for the session sits squarely on the shoulders of the presenter, and rightly so. The content, pacing, climate and structure need to be clearly communicated and consistently enacted. Course evaluations assess how effectively presenters perform across these domains, and offer immediate feedback for improvement. But what about the audience?

Lately I’ve been thinking about individual audience members’ accountability, and the delicacy in creating a climate where each person in the room feels as invested in the value and success of the event as the presenter. This goes beyond learning outcomes and focuses on process (how we engage) as well as content (what we learn).

Most workshops and presentations typically start with some or all of:

Learning outcomes
Session overview or outline
Participants’ learning goals
Pre-session learning assessments.

However, few workshops explicitly build in a chance for participants to identify how they will contribute. In other words, reflecting on how we learn and participate, what might hold us back, and what would make it safe to take risks and participate in ways that might feel downright uncomfortable. I think these questions are crucial precursors to the usual content-focused questions or assessments, because a conversation about process sets the stage for joint responsibility for engagement.

It comes down to a conversation about how we (both presenter and group) collectively want to make the journey together. From a presenter’s perspective, this means starting out by asking questions such as:

Are you coming to this session as a spectator or as a participant?
What are some possible ways into the content that would resonate for you, and how could you amplify these entry points?
What would it take to make you want to step outside your comfort zone?
If you decided to take some risks in the interest of your own ‘deep learning’, how can the group support you?
How will you translate and adapt ideas or applications to make them 100% relevant for you?

You don’t have to ask all five questions, and there are a wealth of other questions you could pose. The key is our intentionality in creating time for all participants to reflect on their roles, and on the nature of the voyage they are going to take with you and one-another.

And the next time I attend a presentation or workshop (or a class, meeting, performance, celebration or other opportunity to actively engage), I will be asking myself: “How do I want to travel?”

How the best slideware equals poetry

November 8, 2015

Post-secondary Education, Presentation Skills

Honesty is the best poetry

I’ve written elsewhere about “PowerPoint Best Practices” and why slide design can make the world a happier place. Images are like poems: their economy is such that they immediately engage our affective (versus cognitive) domain – and affect is hugely influential in learning and knowledge retention. I was briefly obsessed with imagist poetry as a teenager: “that which presents an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time”. (It left its mark.)

The same disciplined simplicity is at the heart of the best and most effective use of beautiful/disturbing/thought-provoking/unexpected visuals accompanying a presentation. (PS: Check out this anthology if you want to learn more about imagism)

“Sounds good, but how can I visually translate MY ideas?” (especially an image that is compelling, novel and adds value)

It’s a fair question. Most academics are trained to frame our ideas and concepts in words, not pictures. Yet words and pictures are both just symbols. For example, this slide deck for a full day workshop on advanced practice in Motivational Interviewing is approximately 80% images – used as placeholders for each of the practice-based activities I facilitated throughout the day.

In short: think about how you would define or translate the one key idea behind what you are trying to communicate. It is more than an excercise in finding pretty pictures – ruthless simplification forces us to reflect on the essential. That which we intend to be most memorable. This can only be a good thing for both presenter and audience!

Major Caveat: Visual communication is especially critical in relation to numeric data. Twenty years ago I never thought of data visualization as a career path, yet these modern-day dowsers are crucial to our understanding of the digital ocean. And that’s a whole other conversation: check out Big Data Science on Twitter. I am a rank amateur compared to what these people do.

If I were presenting this article to you, here is my slide:

(Honesty is the best poetry, Queen St West, Toronto, Canada )

3 Tips for Presenting to Challenging Audiences

October 25, 2015

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If you want to get out alive, never swim against the current

A few weeks ago a colleague shared a harrowing story of a presentation gone wrong. It was one of those scenarios where you don’t anticipate much controversy about what you have to offer, and the group appears jovial. But beware – large groups can sometimes behave like jungle cats. One moment, the regal beast is basking in the sun and purring, and then suddenly the powerful claws will slash and wound. Perhaps this sounds overly dramatic, but I’ve yet to meet a presenter who – somewhere – does not carry a scar from such an encounter. When it’s just you in the “cage” with a couple hundred slumbering lions, it’s best to keep alert and look them in the eyes!

Now, I am not implying that presenters should fear their audiences. Presentations offer an unparalleled opportunity to inspire, communicate and connect. And I’m not suggesting that it’s us (presenters) against them (audiences). That said, we know that individuals have distinct personalities and moods. And like individuals, a group’s mood can shift rapidly; sometimes without warning. It can feel mighty lonely at the front of the room when the group turns ugly.

I’ve written elsewhere about how to “TAME” difficult or challenging participants. But what to do when the whole group seems against you?

The first order of business is listen to understand. What did you say that triggered discord? What might be behind the objections, concerns, indignation or outright scorn among audience members? Modeling a stance of eager curiosity and a humble willingness to listen is disarming. It is profoundly respectful.

Example: “It sounds like this is something we really need to pay attention to. Would you or others be willing to share more? I’m so glad that you spoke up – thank you for raising this.”

The second essential step is to step outside of the content – that is, what you and others are saying – and reflect on the process. Group process refers to the how versus the what. This is expecially important to do if Step 1 results in pure venting and is not especially productive for the group as a whole. The power of reflecting on process as opposed to content is that you make it not just your problem, but the group’s problem. Plus, it is almost certain that while there are dissenting voices in the room, there are also voices that want to help you get things back on track – if you give them the opportunity.

Example: “I want to take a step back and reflect on what’s happening in the room. I noticed that when I said […], there were some strong reactions. I’m wondering what would be most helpful from me at this point? What do others think?”

The third point is to keep an open mind. It may be that you’re pretty invested in the idea or perspective that you are sharing and the audience members’ opposing opinions have provoked defensiveness on your part. This never goes down well. Defensiveness on a presenter’s part can be like throwing gas on a fire. Stay open to the possibility that you might indeed be missing something important, and that the group is offering you a true gift by pointing it out. That doesn’t mean you are obliged to do exactly what others want you to do, or even to change your thinking. It’s simple reciprocity – if I want others to listen to me with an open mind, I need to be willing to do the same.

Example: (inside voice) “Hmmm…I was not expecting this reaction. I wonder if there are others who might have the same reaction. This is worth considering carefully.”

In short, always swim with the current. Trust me, you will eventually make it to shore with only a few scrapes and bruises!

Tell more stories!

September 9, 2015

Presentation Skills, Uncategorized

Clinical Education, Motivational Interviewing, Presentation Skills

“Every person is like all others, some others, and no others.”

Night air, pine trees, starlight and throw another log on the fire. Sitting around a fire-pit makes us all storytellers.

This weekend I finally heard the complete narrative of my dad’s1981 road trip through Canada’s Maritime provinces with Uncle Ulysses. Including the ill-advised (in retrospect) meal of fresh-cooked clams that led to their acute and enduring distress. Like all heroes, Euclid and Ulysses (actual names) valiantly carried on through their itinerary of roadside museums and historic landmarks. It all culminated on the final night of the trip where, after three days of fasting, they deemed it safe to order pizza as an accompaniment to the 6-pack of beer they’d picked up earlier. The smell of fresh pizza proved too much to bear, and as my father put it, “I said: ‘Please don’t hit the beer’; and we never did eat the pizza”. To this day, neither of them has ever tasted shellfish again.

I loved that story, and even more I loved the experience of hearing the story. The fireside version took around 15 minutes and was punctuated with the audience’s questions, observations, digressions, reflections and laughter. It was engaging, relateable, suspenseful, totally human.

This makes me think more about the axiom of “tell more stories” in presentations and workshops. For listeners, the most powerful storytelling experiences are not passive, but rather, involve actively participating as co-authors in the telling. Even in large groups or online or asynchronous learning environments this can take the form of an internal conversation and co-authoring, as each of us relates to our own lives and our personal stories.

So…my lesson learned is to try going beyond just telling stories, and to intentionally create avenues for the audience to participate in the telling. Most training venues and classrooms don’t permit campfires, but I’m inspired to find ways to leverage stories as powerful shared experiences. Every story represents the rich complexity of human experience, as each of us is “like all others, some others, and no others” (paraphrasing Murray and Kluckhohn, 1953).

Stories connect our content to others in powerful ways. Being a better presenter has to involve getting better at storytelling.

How to start – and end – your next presentation with impact!

April 11, 2015

Begin with the ending, end with the beginning

The best presentations are structured like a really good story, with a clear beginning, middle and end. Dale Carnegie’s famous axiom offers a skeleton how-to: “Tell the audience what you’re going to say, say it; then tell them what you’ve said.” But starting your talk with “Today I am going to share with you…” is not the most dynamic or compelling way to capture an audience’s attention. On the other hand, people want a road map – it’s important to orient the group to what they are about to learn and experience.

Begin with the ending

So, what does “beginning with the ending” look like in practice? For me, the ending doesn’t reference the conclusion of my presentation. Rather, the real ending – the whole purpose and intent of my presentation – are the implications for attitudinal, behavioural and/or practice change. In other words, I like to start with where I want the audience to end up – not me!

For example, when I offer clinical workshops on Motivational Interviewing, I begin by asking the group to reflect on specific clients that they find challenging: “Imagine it’s Monday morning, and you get to work, look at your calendar, and see that the first three clients you’re scheduled to see are the most difficult individuals that you’re working with. How are you feeling?” Common responses include “stressed”, “anxious”, “hopeless”, “frustrated” , “annoyed with the person who scheduled these clients!”. Then I say: “Now imagine that you’ve finished this workshop, you get to work tomorrow morning, and you see these same three clients booked into your calendar – and you actually look forward to your morning because you get to try out the skills and strategies that we are going to learn today!”

This brief thought experiment gets people involved right away because it establishes not only the relevance of the content, but its application beyond the workshop.

End with the beginning

I agree that it’s useful to offer a summary of what I’ve covered as I wrap up a presentation or workshop (“tell them what you told them”), but that’s not the end. After summarizing, I make a point of explicitly circling back to the beginning by inviting participants to reflect on where they were when we started our collective learning journey, where they are now…and where they want to go. Bridging the knowledge-practice gap is a challenge, yet therein lies the value of the whole experience. Setting concrete implementation objectives and a plan for follow-up is key.

I also point to the ending as a beginning, and to our continuing development as an ongoing series of new beginnings. We are always still beginning, each time from a different place.

Finally, ending with a great quotation is always a nice touch. Here’s one of my favourite quotes on motivation and change:

So…what will you try out in your next presentation?

The most engaging presenters are…

February 21, 2015

Artifice and performance are the enemies of engagement

I gave a talk yesterday on presentation and facilitation skills, and one of the key themes was the importance of shifting our focus away from ourselves (“Am I doing a good job?” “Do I measure up?”), and directing our attention to the needs and interests of the audience. This marks the crucial shift from performance to conversation.

Paradoxically, at the same time we also need to pay attention to being ourselves. I was struck once again by the “simple but not easy” axiom as it relates to authenticity. On one hand, what is simpler than just being who we are? But on the other hand, what is harder than offering our real, true self in front of a large (or smallish) group?

“The snow goose need not bath to make itself white.

Neither need you do anything but be yourself.” (Lao Tzu)

I’ve never seen a snow goose, but I’ve seen quite a lot of snow this winter. And up close every snow flake is unique and beautiful.

The most engaging presenters are fully focused and radically authentic.

4 ways to make your next presentation “stickier”

November 2, 2014

One of the axioms about great presentation skills is to “make it sticky”

Sounds good, but how? Here are four of tried-and-true strategies (the “application” part is how I say it – you can adapt to your style!).

1. Get people talking

People remember most of what they say, versus what the presenter says

Application: “Take 3 minutes, turn to the person next to you and share one thing that stands out so far”

2. Evoke disagreement

Critical analysis often means criticism – ideas don’t stick if a person hasn’t had a chance to integrate within existing knowledge, assumptions, worldview

Application: “Write down one concern, question or skeptical comment or idea about what I’ve been saying”

3. Initiate a “Teach Back”

No matter how much knowledge/skills/expertise I might have started with, anything I’ve ever had to teach forced me to learn more deeply.

Application: “Find someone you haven’t spoken to yet and teach them ___ (concept, skill, approach, etc.)

4. Bridge the Gap

Don’t be afraid to assign homework.

Application: “Before you go to sleep tonight, write down three things that you are going to practice or do differently based on the work we’ve done here today…and put them on your computer screen/refrigerator/other.”

Last week I was asked to facilitate a workshop for a diverse group of community health and counselling providers. The organizers asked for an outline of the proposed session as well as an overview of a subsequent follow-up session to help ensure uptake and implementation. In other words, why invest in staff training if there’s no traction over the longer term?

The research/education/practice gap is undeniably tough to bridge, and follow-up coaching and training certainly helps increase adoption and skill development. But in my mind, every presentation is an important opportunity to foster motivation for change – with or without follow-up.

Presenting about Presenting

September 21, 2014

It’s often good to follow your own advice

Last Friday I presented to a group of health practitioners (registered dietitians) at their annual conference. The topic was “presentation skills” – an important element of their professional practice, as dietitians frequently work with various client goups experiencing complex and challenging health conditions. They are not just presenting information. It’s more about inspiring and motivating health behaviour change when the stakes are high.

I have always found that ‘presenting about presenting’ poses a particular set of mental challenges. Audience expectations are generally higher than the norm and my expectations of myself are correspondingly escalated. I have to keep reminding myself of the axiom that any presentation needs to feel more like a conversation than a performance. That means focusing on the audience’s learning needs, goals, and practice challenges, as opposed to my own ‘performance’.

And mirroring the dietitians’ clinical practice with groups, the information that I shared was nowhere near the most important part. (There’s a whole library of books written on presenting and facilitating, covering more content and in greater depth than any 45 minute talk could ever do justice to.) Sparking some lively critical reflection and dialogue (internal and external) about the pitfalls and best practices for us all to pay attention to when presenting to groups was the most meaningful part of the session.

It’s often effective to follow one’s own advice, and happily I was able to come reasonably close to putting into practice the four themes of my session:

1. Stop performing

2. Engage everyone

3. Transform your slides

4. Make it sticky.

OK, maybe I didn’t engage absolutely everyone – but on my way out of the room the A/V guy did give a big thumbs-up, and let’s just say that hasn’t been a uniform experience. I say, gather your nuggets where you find them!

An easy tip for high-impact slides

August 11, 2014

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Finding beauty all around you

In a previous post (PowerPoint Design Best Practice) I discussed my #1 tip for creating beautiful and compelling presentation slides:

Just one problem – where to find fabulous backgrounds and images? Although there are lots of “free” image sites online, I have found that many of these tend to be over-used and/or not what I’m looking for. Stock images are a great option and alternative, but subscriptions can be costly.

Believe it or not, you don’t have to be a professional photographer to create your own gorgeous images. Composing and capturing the “perfect shot” is far from easy, but there is great beauty in the tiny details that surround us every day. Here are some examples of pictures I’ve taken that I can’t wait to use in future presentations. The extreme close-up strategy makes it easy even for rank amateurs like me to create my own image stock with a borrowed camera during a morning walk.

The 3 best (and 3 worst) PowerPoint Practices

August 6, 2014

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3 + 3 ‘Dos and Don’ts’ for Slideware Best Practices (plus a bonus tip)

Text-heavy slides + presenter’s commentary = missed opportunity. That’s because audiences experience “channel interference” when they’re confronted with text on a screen in tandem with spoken commentary. It’s challenging to both read and listen at the same time. (Like, for example, Saturday morning when you’re immersed in the weekend paper and significant other wants to chat.)

Even worse is reading the text directly from your slides, because people can read silently faster than you can read out loud (plus that announces to the audience that you are actually redundant, assuming that they can read your slides for themselves). On the other hand, seeing an image plus listening to a person speak does not create this channel interference, and engages us both visually and aurally.

In a nutshell, here are my 3 + 3 key ‘Dos and Don’ts’ for Slideware Best Practices:

DO break up complex diagrams and visual illustrations into “chunks” offered over a series of slides, and/or provide a handout of the entire image.

DO use an image scaled to cover the whole slide, perhaps accompanied by minimal text (or just a single word or phrase).

DO proofread your slides. Then go back and proofread them again.

DON’T put the content of your talk on your slides. That’s what handouts are for.

DON’T use PowerPoint templates and clip art. These look retro – and not in a good way.

DON’T use text animations. Unless you are a creative director for an ad agency with a big budget, and even then think twice.

Bonus tip: If you ever hear yourself apologizing for any [easily preventable] part of your presentation (for example, slides unreadable from the back of the room, random typos, content on a slide that you don’t really understand), chalk it up to presentation karma…and gather these nuggets of feedback for your cache of hard-earned wisdom.

Presentation Secrets (5): Authenticity

July 28, 2014