Preparation and Planning

What follows are a series of tips and suggestions that our teachers and facilitators have fed back to us about how they managed their preparation work. While they felt ready to get straight into the discussions and dialogues with their class, many felt that they could have prepared better in advance. In some instances, the students took longer to get “acclimatised” to the new approach, because they felt that this was “just another class”. In other cases, the facilitator dived straight into the new approach without giving the students any signals or clues. In these instances the approach took longer to bed down because the students felt that they were “free to do what they wanted”.

Creating a balance is key, bringing the students with you is critical.

Things to remember when you are getting started

Ensure consent forms are collected and signed. Before starting into the sessions in the classroom, you will need to get video and imaging consent from the children and their parents or guardians. As well as dealing with the importance of getting the consent of all partners, this also allows for the parents or guardians to be involved and aware of the CEPNET activities. They may have some questions for you. But it also means that they are aware that there is this new programme happening and they may be asked to get involved to provide some support as Phases 1, 2 and 3 are implemented. You might also use the school newsletter or website to alert the wider school community about the project. You might want to draw on their network of influence and contacts at a later stage!!! In this initial communication, you can make use of a video introduction to the CEPNET project if you consider useful. Think about your school environment and accessibility issues. Choose a room in your school, if possible, that has natural day light, space to move around and is comfortable, but not too relaxing! Will you be able to take the students outside to a yard at some point? WIll the students be able to work peacefully in groups in different parts of the school? Again, these types of considerations can be worked out to give the students a certain amount of control over their work environment. Think about other practical arrangements such as seating, lighting, refreshments, heating, technology and placing of desks. Is it worth moving the desks to create a circle? For some of our teachers, this helped to let the students know that they were moving on from the previous type of classwork. Provide a range of resources for children to record their discussions such as notebooks, pens, flip chart paper, low cost no cost materials for creative exercises, post its etc. The students may also want to record some of their work. Is such technology available in the school? It might be simply a case that a mobile phone can be used to record some audio or video, linked to an interview. Allow the children to move around and vary the social constellations of the small groups initially until they come to a natural forming group of interest. While many of the project groups within the CEPNET classes eventually formed linked to friendship groups, the focus on subjects and topics of interest also became an important factor. Provide healthy, low carbohydrates refreshments where appropriate. Consider fresh fruit and water to keep energy levels up! Introduce the potential for online discussions and social interaction with other schools – locally, nationally or internationally. As our students became involved in many of their online dialogues with classrooms in other countries, the types of snacks very often became a subject of conversation, leading to the students becoming more relaxed with each other. So be aware, there are always side effects and unintended consequences. But clearly, preparation is key… Think about different strategies to get the children involved. The following training modules consistently refer to a range of facilitation methods that you may already be very familiar with. Even if you are used to seeing yourself as a facilitator as well as an educator and teacher, our experience of CEPNET and its successful implementation very much comes down to the idea of the teacher stepping back and allowing the students and children to take over. The facilitation resources, notes and tips will hopefully help you in this process.

Following this checklist of preparatory steps will allow you to create an atmosphere in your classroom where the students feel relaxed and ready for the start of the discussions and dialogues.