Today I listened to an excellent web cast by Lenn Millbower, President of Offbeat Training on Conquering the Creatures in the Classroom. It was such a timely topic which he so aptly themed Halloween style. Happy Halloween everyone!

In it he presented information on different types of audience members one usually encounters in the classroom, presented ways to work with them and to offset their distracting tendencies. He also showed how any classroom presentation would mimic a performance with a prologue which captures that audience’s attention,, act 1 which sets up the story, act 2 which puts the plot into motion and act 3 which resolves the conflict. He said that approach addresses the needs of most learners from those that need to talk, reflect, test or try out different learning concepts. Each of these also addresses a key question respectively, Why pay attention? What is it all about? How does the solution work? and Where can I apply it?

As a public speaker and facilitator I appreciate being reminder of the key challenges of keeping the audience engaged and learning new strategies on how to approach all different types of audience members. Strategies that help trainers succeed in the classroom are also very valuable to people like me who like to public speak and facilitate sessions. As I reflected on what I heard Lenn say, I realized that in a way, it illustrates the framework that I use when I am preparing to facilitate a meeting. I address all 4 questions as part of my preparation and often times specifically ask the last 3 questions.

Most of the time, I do not really ask the questions why pay attention. However, I always start by providing the audience with a story that illustrates the reason why we should pay attention or why the issues that we will be addressing at the meeting are important. This is my prologue.

Then I facilitate group discussions around the other three questions. Finally, at the end of the facilitation, I bring everyone back together to summarize our discussion in one final act and conclude with why it was important.

Happy Halloween! And if you are still looking for a costume, the images represent costumes available on Amazon.