Roger Greenaway - Active Reviewing

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Active Reviewing

A Practical Guide for Trainers and Facilitators

A bout us ...

One day in the summer of 2014, Clin Iepure travelled to Bucharest in search of new ideas to use in his work as a trainer. Clin had signed up for a two day trainer-training workshop with me (Roger Greenaway). During this workshop he got very excited about how he could use these new ideas in his work as a trainer. He then shared these ideas with Bogdan Vaida (a fellow trainer from Timioara) and they both started experimenting with these dynamic training techniques. Soon their colleagues started showing an interest and they decided to invite me to provide a workshop in Timioara in the spring of 2015.

Over meals and coffee breaks, we started talking about making an online training course together. We quickly realised that in addition to our shared interest in making training more interactive, we each had a set of complementary skills: Clin's work with business start-ups and entrepreneurship; Bogdan's work with online training videos and my own niche providing training workshops in active reviewing skills and techniques.

... and a bit about the book

After launching our online course in the summer of 2015, we decided to create a book version of the online course. You may find that this book is all you need, but at some point you may decide that you would like to take a look at the more detailed online course.

I hope you find your journey into the world of active reviewing as rewarding as Clin found on his trip to the big city in the summer of 2014. On the next page, Bogdan takes over as the main narrator in your new book.

May your future participants enjoy the new opportunities that active reviewing opens up for them. No more dull debriefs!

Dr. Roger Greenaway

I f you want to help people learn from activities, exercises or experiences, this book is for you. This book fills a gap; it is the gap between doing an activity and learning from it. Plenty of books describe activities that are good for icebreaking, for team-building, for project management or for cross-cultural understanding, etc. A few of these books do give advice about reviewing (or debriefing) the activities, and 90% of the times it reads: Here are some questions you can ask .... Hows that for boring and/or limiting?

The result of such advice is that reviews are often dull and they dwell on what went wrong. But why is that? Well, one of the reasons is because the same people speak up all the time. And that bores and might even annoy the rest of the participants. Thus, reviewing gets a bad name and people just want the review to finish as quickly as possible so that they can get on with the next activity.

This is a rare book for two reasons:

1. It is about reviewing (How many books have you come across on this subject?)
2. It is about reviewing actively .(Which makes it not just rare, but unique.)

With the help of this book, you can make reviews at least as engaging as the activities you are reviewing. No more discomfort. No more unwanted silences. No more superficial reviews. Just engaging and practical ways to help people learn from experience! How does that sound for a change?

Before we go any further, lets take a look at the conspicuous verb of the day- to review. The Free Dictionary.com has provided us with the following definition and of course, correct pronunciation:

review (r-vyoo)

v. reviewed , reviewing , reviews

v.tr.

To look over, study, or examine again: reviewed last week's lesson.

To consider retrospectively; look back on: reviewed the day's events.

To examine with an eye to criticism or correction: reviewed the research findings.

To write or give a critical report on (a new work or performance, for example).

Reading a definition already? My God, how boring! No, thats not the way to do it... Well, the truth is that reviewing can be all of these things youve read but at the same time, it CAN be a whole lot more. Reviewing is the key to learning from what happens; it gives you the opportunity to learn from mistakes and then build on what works well. Through reviewing you can explore mysteries, gain fresh insights and discover new possibilities!

Oh and then there is Active Reviewing ... this REALLY helps to ensure that reviewing is not just an intellectual exercise. Its far more dynamic because it involves thinking aloud with others, physical movement and communicating in ways that engage multiple senses and intelligences. Active reviewing uses and develops a broad range of learning skills. And at the end of it all, it also means testing out what you think you have learned ;)

Now, the word of the day here is dynamic, so please highlight it. That is the key to understanding real, useful ways of reviewing. Also, if you want to find out how Archimedes came up with the whole Eureka business and how this will help you become a better trainer, dont stop here! Read on!

A rchimedes was a Greek scientist who lived in Syracuse nearly 200 years ago. Back then there was a certain King of the land and he wanted to wear a Golden Crown. (Quite fancy if you ask me...) So he gave some gold to a goldsmith to make a suitable crown. After a few days, the goldsmith brought the finished crown to the King. Naturally, the crown was weighed and it turned out that the weight of the crown was the same with the amount of gold given previously to the smith. Odd much? The King looked at the color of the crown and it too, arose suspicion. He thought that maybe the goldsmith had stolen some metal during the making of the crown. Consequently, he summoned his court scientist Archimedes and gave him the task of finding out the truth.

How did Archimedes do it? Well, the scientist thought about the problem day and night until one day... He was about to have his bath, but because he was too busy mulling over the task at hand, didnt notice that in the meantime, the bathtub had filled up with water. He just went into it and as a result, the water flowed over the brim of the bathtub. This whole incident gave him a brilliant idea and in his excitement he shouted Eureka! Eureka!. Eureka in Greek means, I have found it.

The Greek thinker had in fact discovered a physics law: different metals of the same weight have different volumes. Or in plain English- objects put in water will displace water...and the displaced water will be equal to their volume.

For example, an iron cube weighing a kilogram will disperse a certain amount of water. But an aluminum cube of the same weight will displace more water than the iron cube. Archimedes used this as the premise and thus, worked out a plan to find out the purity of the gold in the Kings crown.

The Greek thinker took two bowls. He filled them with water to the brim. Then he placed each bowl separately in the middle of two large basins. He placed the crown in one bowl and saw that the water overflowed and had collected at the bottom of the outer bowl. Next step was to take a cube of pure gold. This cube of gold was equal in weight to the crowns and Archimedes proceeded with it in the same manner; he put this gold cube in the middle of the second bowl. Naturally, water overflowed (again!) and it got collected at the bottom of the bowl.