TOOLS FOR CHANGE

• You will find most (but not all) of the practical pages on this site listed below.
• You can print out a list of the 100+ active reviewing methods in Playback.
• You can sign up for the free monthly Active Reviewing Tips newsletter.
• You can search the archives of Active Reviewing Tips.
• You can take advantage of new search methods to find tools on this site and other sites.
• You can browse Roger's Active Learning Bookshop or learn about Roger's training workshops.

What's here now  - the most practical pages in the Guide to Active Reviewing

 

How Review? some practical considerations from Playback: A Guide to Reviewing Activities.

 

Rounds a basic method with some useful variations from Playback: A Guide to Reviewing Activities.

 

Raising Self-Esteem 13 strategies listed in More Than Activities

 

Reducing Offending 21 strategies listed in More Than Activities

 

Active Reviewing: bringing the worlds of talk and action together. This article describes various active reviewing methods - basic and advanced - used in work with managers and young people.

 

Feedback Exercises Giving and receiving personal feedback - creative and focused methods that have been used successfully with youth and adult groups.

 

Story making and telling as a reviewing method - 30 variations, limitless applications. This is a 'how to' extension of Stories in Learning

 

Action Replay (and Variations) Benefits, Variations, Do you need an audience? Exaggeration, Reconstruction, Theatre of the Absurd.

 

Evaluation Methods 40 'end of course' methods and how these can fit into an overall evaluation strategy. This section now includes an example of the 'Give and Take Evaluation Form' that I use during and at the end of my training workshops. There is also a form for longer term follow-up. Participants can fill these out online.

 

Reviewing with Pictures: how to use ready-made and learner-made pictures in reviewing. There is now an easy to print version of Reviewing with Pictures

 

Reviewing Success: getting the positive/negative balance right in reviewing. If you are short of ideas about reviewing positive/successful experiences, don't be surprised if your reviewing sessions dwell on negatives. Find some happy and effective alternatives here.

 

Review Discussions: having a chat or conducting an interrogation? Whatever your own preferred style might be, does it suit all the learning styles of the learners you are reviewing with? Also some tips on dealing with common problems in discussions.

 

Outdoor Management Development: some questions, some answers and an index of reviewing tools, articles and research in outdoor management development.

 

Questions: Questions for Success. More pages about questions - and another FAQ about reviewing will have links from here.

 

Solo Challenge is an exercise that involves creative negotiation, imagination, caring, co-operation, understanding, reviewing and ... challenge! It is suitable for an established learning group of 6 to 12 people. At least 90 minutes is needed for this three part exercise.

 

Sharing Learning: Presentations shows how participants can share their experiences and their learning with others. Performing describes how (without special training in drama skills) people can create and produce a play for performing to an audience. Reports is about ways of generating and recording learning experiences and achievements.

 

Reviewing with Large Groups: Issues, solutions, strategies and methods.

 

High Speed Reviewing Techniques: especially useful near the end of an event when there is so much to reveiw and so little time ...

 

Success Store: Reviewing Tools for Developing Potential

• Where has all the potential gone?
• How can you raise Self-Esteem?
• What's in your Success Store?

 

Quick Reviews: 25 methods for 1, 2, 5, 10 and 20 minute reviews.

 

Reviewing with Ropes: 12 methods. Ropes are a handy resource for active reviewing (objective lines, deciding lines, position lines, happy charts, body maps, activity maps, mapping journeys, drawing ...) You need plenty of space indoors or outdoors.

 

Visible Reflection Techniques: Why make learning active and visual? Four methods and their recommended applications:
Q JUMPING: makes contribution levels visible.
Recommended use: for encouraging more balanced participation.
MOVING MARKERS: makes the quality of the group process visible.
Recommended use: for monitoring group process while working on a task.
CHANGING PLACES: seeing yourself as others see you.
Recommended use: for developing empathy and providing feedback.
REPLAY: noticing what was missed first time around.
Recommended use: for easing conflict and for building trust and understanding.

 

Reviewing Ropes Course Experiences
This article about re-enacting physical activities includes:

• Seven Benefits of Action Replay
• Eight Ways of Staging Action Replay
• Miniature Replays
• Walk-Through Commentary

 

Big Picture Reviewing

 

Reviewing by Numbers

As new 'tools' pages appear you will find links to them from this page. To save you searching here for new pages, you can subscribe to the free ezine Active Reviewing Tips for monthly updates, tools, and practical reviewing tips.

What's to come - in the 'Tools for Change' section of Guide to Active Reviewing

 

How to Transfer Learning: More of the material supporting this workshop will be appearing in Tools For Change. Workshop details

 

Young People at Risk: how the reviewing of activities (and other experiences) can be of particular value to young people who are struggling more than most. (This will be a development of the ideas and strategies you will find now on the Strategies page.)

 

Flipchart-Free Reviewing: yes it's possible! A whole culture has built up around the flipchart - a useful tool, but much overused and forest-unfriendly. Substitute methods are described. Learners will enjoy a break from routine - and so will you. So will the forests.
[This theme was begun in Active Reviewing Tips 1.3]

 

Development Training: the coming together of the 'training' culture of focused objectives (with or without flip charts) enhanced by the 'developmental' culture of more open-ended and holistic purposes. A dynamic combination which gives birth to some innovative reviewing practices - some of which will be described!
[There is already a 'development training' section on this site that includes a bibliography and definitions, but it does not yet include 'tools'.]

 

Reviewing Styles: why have a range of styles and how do you choose? Examples of the possibilities and an assessment of the benefits of developing a more varied reviewing style. [This theme is frequently explored in Active Reviewing Tips but has yet to be brought together into a full article.]

 

Appraisal and feedback: one of the most valuable aspects of reviewing - seeing yourself as others see you. How to conduct such sessions so that everyone is a winner.
[Some pages on this theme already exist: Feedback Exercises, Appreciating Success and Giving and Receiving Feedback - including 18 active methods.]

 

Research: a research angle on reviewing - with a practical focus. Experiential learning theory underlines the importance of reviewing. So why is it that some people seem to learn or benefit from experience without (apparently) going through a reviewing process? [Meanwhile, see Food for Thought and the research index - which are more thought-provoking than practical.]

 

Designing activities and programmes: designing reviewing into experience- based programmes. Carefully designed courses may not create the kinds of experiences that were predicted. To what extent can (and should) you design 'experience'? The greater the unpredictability of the training or work environment, the greater will be the need for reviewing skills!
[Designing activities and programmes for young people is described in my first book: More Than Activities The emphasis on this new page about design will be about design the reviewing structure for a course before choosing activities. The principles and examples will apply to youth and adults courses.]

Future Topics will also include:

• involvement and motivation - techniques for engaging and sustaining interest in reviewing
• using time effectively - time-saving techniques and the timing of reviews
• issues in reviewing - how to work through difficult situations, conflict, resistance to learning etc.
• more evaluation methods - how to improve and demonstrate the value of experiential learning provision.
• 'how to review' topics suggested by visitors to this site
• 'how to review' contributions from visitors to this site

• Write to: roger@reviewing.co.uk to ask for a topic to be included in the 'Tools for Change' section of this Guide to Active Reviewing. Suggest a brand new topic or choose one from the list above.
• Write to: roger@reviewing.co.uk to offer a topic to be included
• Write to: roger@reviewing.co.uk to recommend a useful source e.g. a reference to a useful web page, web site, book, article etc. about reviewing.

Your help in developing the content of this section and in making links to other practical resources (about reviewing experience) will be greatly appreciated - by all visitors to this 'Tools For Change' section of The Guide to Active Reviewing.

Search tools to find more reviewing tools 
Since this page was first created there are now more ways of searching for reviewing tools in The Online Guide to Active Reviewing and Debriefing.

1. THE SEARCH BOX (at the top of this page)
2. ACTIVE REVIEWING TIPS ARCHIVES
3. THE A-Z INDEX
4. ADVANCED SITE SEARCH where you will find even more options.
5. Take a 'Guided Tour' of the key reviewing pages on this site (first box below)