Critical & Creative Thinking Program using critical and creative thinking to develop reflective practice as we change our work, learning, and lives

Quick Links

• Register
• Directions
• Brief Agenda
• Check-in ( signup)
• Rooms (Master sheet)

---

Program (as of 4/28/19)

Goals
Overall: In this one-day "Connecting-Puzzling-Reflecting" (CPR) conference-workshop we will create spaces, interactions, and support that help us recognize and extend our projects of changing our schools, workplaces, and lives.
Tangible goals for participants

1. To undertake sense-making review of our own evolving projects of changing our schools, workplaces, and lives
2. To gain inspiration and new insights by sharing the ways CCT'ers have been and plan to continue changing our schools, workplaces, and lives
3. To produce work-in-progress presentations about our projects and plans, gain feedback, and revise the presentations for sharing beyond the workshop.
4. For participants to learn and practice Tools and Processes that facilitate substantive knowledge sharing, inquiry, critique, and discussion. In particular:
   • to learn about the 4Rs approach: “A well-facilitated collaborative process keeps us listening actively to each other, fostering mutual Respect that allows Risks to be taken, elicits more insights than any one person came in with (Revelation), and engages us in carrying out and carrying on the plans we develop (Re-engagement). What we come out with is very likely to be larger and more durable than what any one person came in with; the more so, the more voices that are brought out by the process” (http://wp.me/p1gwfa-nC). (The detailed documentation in this program are intended to support adoption/adaption of the tools and processes.)
   • to learn from this conference-workshop experiment how hybrid in-person and from-a-distance participation works and needs to be improved.

Experiential goals (how the process will affect our way of being)

1. As participants, our experience of gaining insights about critical, creative, and reflective practice excites each of us about the prospect of conversations extending beyond the 1-day CPR workshop (in time and in who participates).
2. Our experience of engagement in the tools and processes, especially using the 4Rs approach, excites us to seek out and pursue other engagements in a similar manner, in particular, to “connect quickly with others who are almost ready… to foster participatory processes and, through the experience such processes provide their participants, contribute to enhancing the capacity of others to do likewise” (Taylor 2005, Unruly Complexity, p. 225).

Registration
Register: http://bit.ly/cct40rego

(Before you complete this registration form, compose a paragraph description of where you have come in and beyond the CCT Program at UMass Boston and where you plan to further changes you have made. (Suggested format: Sense-Making review.)

1. indicate whether you will attend in person or online. If in person, let us know whether you can bring a laptop or smart phone (with zoom app installed).
2. provide a paragraph description (or sense-making review) of where you have come in and beyond the CCT Program at UMass Boston and where you plan to further changes you have made.
3. provide the title of a work-in-progress presentation if you plan to prepare something written and send to organizer for pre-circulation by April 20.
   • (Suggested but not required format: Expand the sense-making review into 2 pages. Longer is OK if you are so moved or if you have graphics and photos that illustrate your work and journey--past and desired future.)
4. indicate where you want help thinking about related to where you are going (e.g., how to expand the range of people engaged with my project, how to build an audience for my next show…,).
5. provide emails or other contact information for any CCT alums you know (with a prize tba for the person who provides the most contacts that end up registering).

Registration is free, but a hat will be passed around to cover reception & dinner for those staying.
Participants are encouraged to order a discount copy of the new edition of Taking Yourself Seriously: A Fieldbook of Processes of Research and Engagement, which will be delivered to in-person participants on the day or online participants by mail. Proceeds subsidize workshops like this one.
Participants are also encouraged to contribute generously to the Delores Gallo fund.

Advance set up by organizers
Prepare the google forms and make visible on the private google drive the sheets of what is submitted in registration and the pre-circulated presentations. One of the sheets is the "one thing that I want help thinking about related to my project" submissions reformatted as a signup sheet .
Share the google pages with registrants.
Prepare printouts for in-person participants of program with instructions, participants and their projects, and room assignments.

Advance preparation by participants
Email hosts if you encounter problems with any of the steps below: Peter or Jeremy.

Read the pre-circulated written presentations on the google drive site.
Sign-up here for discussions of two of these presentations.

Reread the paragraph from your registration reminding yourself of the project that you want to advance during workshop (or submit/revise it).
Reread the "I want help think about" issue from your registration (or submit/revise it). Sign up to be helper for others.
Sign up for zoom and practice starting a personal zoom session and emailing invites to join.
Visit the conference zoom host room anytime beforehand to check that you can connect over audio and video. Practice using the screenshare option (which might be needed for one of the sessions).

In-person participants: Bring a laptop or smart phone (fully charged).
Online participants should prepare their meals and refreshments in advance so they can chat with people during the meal and refreshment breaks. You should also print out a copy of this program with instructions and bookmark the Master Sheet for session rooms (bit.ly/cct40rooms).
Participants are encouraged to order a discount copy of the new edition of Taking Yourself Seriously: A Fieldbook of Processes of Research and Engagement, which will be delivered to in-person participants on the day or online participants by mail. Proceeds subsidize workshops like this one.

Set up
Physical: Table for check-in, with laptop for receiving and entering info, and with cell phone for texts.
Numbered locations, each having a monitor and laptop for local participants to join a zoom room.
Signs for rooms and reminding in-person participants to turn off their wifi always when not needing to be online.
Online: Zoom rooms opened.

Time 8:30-8:55
Check-in
Check-in Coordinator in host room ask participants to:

1. print name in large block letters on sticky name tag (including online participants)
2. provide your name on the google sign up sheet for two of the pre-circulated presentations that you are most interested to discuss (if you haven't done so already);
3. take (or download) a copy of the program with instructions;
4. sign up (if you haven't already) on this sheet for two ‘I want help thinking about’ topic groups in session 3.
5. go to the room number to which the Master Sheet directs you. A host in that room will cue you in if you are late or need additional guidance.
   • (After check-in, host coordinator completes "I want help think about" sheet and preferences for which work-in-progress to discuss then fills in Master sheet (and printed copy posted at Check-in table) with assignments for sessions 2 and 3.)

Time 9:00
Session 1, Getting Here & Exposing Diverse Points of Potential Interaction
This activity emphasizes Respect—for yourself and others—from the outset, making it more comfortable for you to Risk talking about your personal journey. You may gain insights—Revelations—from what you hear yourself include in your stories.

• Welcome from room coordinator
• Initial 5-minute activity (guided freewriting on hopes for this 1-day workshop)
• 30-second introductions in pairs (= name & hopes for the workshop)
• Autobiographical Introductions: “How I came to be someone who would want to share and hear about past and desired future Journeys in Changing Our Schools, Workplaces, and Lives”
  • Equal time for everyone (=5 minutes, or less if the group starts late).
  • Gives participants an opportunity to introduce themselves in narrative depth, their current and emerging work, and learn more about each other
  • Coordinator goes first to model
  • Everyone uses this online form, http://bit.ly/CECandE, to note, for each introduction, a point of Connection with the speaker and a point in which they might Extend what is said (which can be taken in many directions, e.g., suggest something for the speaker to read, adopt or adapt something to their own work, look further into something). (Responses will be formatted by check-in coordinator and shared after the session on here.)
  • After the first three introductions stop to draw connections and discuss with a neighbor what is emerging.
  • Last 5 minutes (finishing at 10:10): Decide as a group one common thread and one tension among the participants' stories.

Time 10:15
Session 2, Digging Down Deep & Exposing More Points of Potential Interaction
Respect continues to be emphasized—everyone, not only for the writer of the work-in-progress presentation, is an agent in shaping what can emerge from a reading. The Respect-full experience in session 1 prepares the way for the Risk involved for the primary discussants speaking in front of the gathering as a whole. They may gain insights—Revelations—from what they hear themselves say. The listeners may too as they chew on what they share with the various speakers and how they differ from them.
There are two 30-minute halves to this session, separated by a 5-minute break. In each part, the author of a pre-circulated written presentation meets with people ready to discuss their responses. The groups will have been posted on the Master Sheet.
Once the group is seated, the author introduces the format:
“The author can take a few minutes, not to summarize their presentation, but to add context or framing that may not have been obvious or updates since the presentation was submitted.
Then each person has 4 minutes (no more, no less) [or 5 if the group is small] to describe how the pre-circulated reading intersects with or stimulates their own thinking. It is more important for groups members to express this, than for them to refer to particulars of the pre-circulated presentation. (If the group is too large for everyone to speak, non-speakers should post their responses inside the written presentation on the google drive.)
The author stays quiet until all others have had their turn, but then has 4-5 minutes to describe how the group has stimulated their thinking.
If there is time remaining, free-form discussion can happen. Put your name in the chat bar enter the queue for talking.”
The author asks for a volunteer to start. When each person finishes, they call on a person to follow.

TIme 11:20
Break

• Looking ahead to Session 3: “Each ‘I want help thinking about’ topic group meets for 18 minutes, so that each of you participates in three topic groups, one after the other. One of these is the group that you identified as wanting help on when you registered. Consult the signup sheet and write down which time slot this is (repeated on the Master Sheet). Be ready to open a personal zoom room and invite the other two participants using their emails (listed on the signup sheet, which may hvae been updated since the initial check-in period). (Ask for help from a host in room 1 if you are not confident about the steps.) For the other two time slots, just look out for the emailed invites.
• Once participants have refreshments, they are encouraged to move to a random choice of the regular zoom rooms then chat during the break with others (online or in person) who are there. (That keeps the online participants included.) Five minutes before the session starts, move to a place where you won't be disturbed by others speaking.

Time: 11:45
Session 3, “I Want Help Thinking About” (a variant of http://bit.ly/Oneonone)
Respect and Risk continue to be emphasized in asking everyone to take initiative in asking for help. You can hope to gain insights—Revelations—from what you hear yourselves ask for and from how you respond to queries and suggestions from others. At the same time, the other topic-group members can gain insights from hearing how they respond to the request for help.
Each ‘I want help thinking about’ topic group meets for 18 minutes. After participants have accepted the emailed zoom invite from the originator of the topic, that person explains what help they seek and the group takes it from there. (If anyone is missing after 2 minutes, start without them. If noone shows up or if noone email invites you, go to the host room and try to find someone to have a "I want help thinking about" conversation with.)
One participant should set a timer to give a 2-minute warning for a group to finish up.

Time 12:45
Session 4, Lunch plus

• fund-raising for Delores Gallo fund
• digestion of feedback from sessions 1 (C&E), 2, and 3
• preparation of spoken work-in-progress presentations
  • (Anyone preparing visual aids should practice screen sharing them on zoom.)

Time 2:45
Session 5, Work-in-Progress Presentations (rationale)
Revelation—new insights—get brought into focus as you prepare a presentation to others, hear yourselves deliver it, and get feedback
Go to the room number to which the Master Sheet directs you.
Each participant has 5 minutes to get started, present, and get spoken feedback

• (Any in-person participant using visual aids should share them by joining the zoom room to give their presentation.)

Every other participant provides Plus-delta feedback on each presentation via the form http://bit.ly/PlusDelta

• (If you handwrite your feedback, enter it into the form by 9am tomorrow. The plus-delta feedback will then be assembled and shared here.)

Time 3:45
Break

Time 4:00
Session 6, Dialogue Hour (http://bit.ly/FivePhase)
Respect, Risk, and Revelation are emphasized in the listening—not only to others but also to oneself (even if silently)—that happens in a Dialogue Process. By the end of the Dialogue Hour and Closing Circle participants should be clear about at least some issues that have (Re)engaged you through the experience of the 1-day workshop.
Go to the room number to which the Master Sheet directs you.
Room coordinator leads participants through five-phase format dialogue on topic: “Review the 1-day workshop insights and experience. Share our thinking about how each of us can extend the insights and experience.”

• For main (3rd)phase, Guidelines are circulated, with each person reading one item then passing along.
• Last phase is replaced by Critical Incident Questionnaire.
  • (These are assembled and posted on the private google drive folder.)

Time 5:00
Session 7, Closing Circle
Taking stock and identifying alternative paths before proceeding on from an activity or event is important to strengthen participants' Revelations and Re-engagements as well as for the workshop model to be repeated, to evolve in response to evaluations, and to be adapted by participants.
Everyone comes to Host room (aka room 1 or zoom).
Each participant has 30 seconds to state one highlight OR appreciation OR suggestion OR thing they are taking away from the 1-day workshop to do more work with.

• (Although very brief, having this aired in the group–having it witnessed–makes it more likely to happen.)

One person starts then passes the (figurative or literal) mic to a neighbor.

• (Host coordinator audio-records the closing. The audio is posted on the private google drive folder.)

Time 5:15
Social gathering (5:15) & dinner (6:15)

• visit by Dean at 6:15pm
• fund-raising for Delores Gallo fund
• Tributes
  (Compilation of testimonials since mid-90s)
• Expectation is that you sit next to and speak with someone you haven’t gotten to know, perhaps circulating to keep doing this.

End at Time 8:15

Follow up by organizers and coordinators

1. Get help to tidy up the space.
2. Transcribe & collate gathered thoughts from session 5, phase 4; post to private google drive folder
3. Transcribe audio-recording of closing; post to private google drive folder.
4. Send out email encouraging participants to share updates on projects and to email everyone when they have.
5. Post any revised paragraphs or presentations (see below) that participants indicate can be viewed publicly.

Follow up by participants

1. Peruse what is posted on the private google drive folder (see above).
2. Submit a revised paragraph or two describing the state of your project after the help and stimulation of the 1-day workshop (e.g., through connections made, new ideas encountered, feedback on your formulation of the project and your plans). Indicate whether the paragraph(s) can be shared on this publicly visible google drive folder (TBA).
3. Participants who prepared a presentation indicate whether it can be shared on this publicly visible google drive folder.