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Session 3. Facilitating Colleagues
Objective. Facilitate a group of colleagues with clear instructions, open questions and protocols that give everyone a voice, and respond calmly and respectfully to difficult moments.
A well-designed workshop can still fall apart in the room: one voice fills every silence, a senior colleague doubts the idea, two people mark notebooks. Facilitation is the skill of keeping the design alive when people behave like people. This lesson goes deeper than the key ideas: the moves that make you talk less and listen more, and how structures protect both quiet and loud voices.
Key ideas
The facilitator's three jobs
- Set the purpose and the time; guide the process (groups, tasks, questions); protect every voice. A facilitator does not need to be the best expert in the room.
- You are a colleague who prepared, not a judge. Say: 'I have prepared a way to work on this; you know your classes better than I do.'
- Show respect for seniority and experience: ask older colleagues to share what has worked, and say 'I don't know, let us find out' when you do not.
Instructions and questions
- Give instructions in three parts: SAY what to do, SHOW an example or the finished product, CHECK that people understand, and fix the time and the product on paper. Write the time on the board.
- Ask open questions: 'What did you notice?', 'What would this look like in your Grade 5 class?', 'What could go wrong?' Then wait several seconds in silence; counting silently to seven helps.
- Replace 'Any questions?' with 'Turn to your partner and agree one question.' Paraphrase answers so that people feel heard: 'So you are saying that...'
Protocols that give every voice a turn
- 1-2-4-All: one minute of silent thinking, two minutes in pairs, four minutes in fours, then the whole group shares what stood out. Quiet people and talkers both have space.
- Silent writing before talk, a round where each person speaks for 30 seconds without comments, and the right to say 'pass' are simple tools that need only paper and a watch.
- Keep a 'parking lot' sheet on the wall for off-topic points and promise to return to it at the end. These structures are described in the free Liberating Structures menu.
Difficult moments and ethics
- Most difficult moments are information. A talker wants to be useful; silence may mean the task is unclear; 'we tried it and it failed' holds experience you can use; marking notebooks may mean the topic does not fit their work.
- Respond with structure and a question, not a rebuke: switch to silent writing and pairs, ask 'what happened and what would need to be different?', link the task to their own lessons, park the issue, or use the cut line.
- Ethics: do not name colleagues or pupils in examples without their consent, do not judge a colleague in front of others, and never pass what was said in the room to management as a report on individuals.
1-2-4-All, step by step
Talk less, listen more
A facilitator who answers every comment becomes a bottleneck: people speak to you, not to each other. Practise four small moves. Pause before responding. Paraphrase in one sentence ('so the problem is time, not the idea'). Invite more with 'say more about that'. And hand the question back: 'who would like to add to that, or see it differently?' Stand beside the group, not behind a desk.
Nerves are normal, especially with older colleagues. Write the first sentence of each part on a card, rehearse your three-part instructions aloud once, and arrive early to arrange chairs in groups of three or four. Agree two ground rules at the start: what is said here stays here, and what is learned leaves with you. This tells colleagues that the room is for learning, not for being judged.
Structures protect every voice
A simple structure does the hard work for you. Silent writing first gives slower thinkers time. Pairs let shy people try an idea in a safe place. Fours let ideas combine, and the final whole-group round only hears what is new. Roles help too: a timekeeper, a scribe and a reporter in each group, rotated so that a talkative person is not always the reporter.
Keep structures light. One UK study of teacher learning groups, listed in the links, found that benefits were weakened when groups were imposed, squeezed out by other duties or run to a rigid format. So explain why you use a structure, give a choice where you can, keep to the time you promised and adjust if the group needs it. A structure is a servant of the learning, not a rule that must be obeyed.
Examples from the classroom
What must be different this time?
Scene. In Bukhara, Gulnora says the idea was tried in 2015 and failed. Jasur breathes, then asks, 'What exactly happened, and what would need to be different?' She names three things: no time to prepare, classes of 38 pupils and no printed cards. Jasur writes them on the board. The group then adapts the activity into a 20-minute version for large classes with pre-printed cards. Gulnora agrees to try it.
Insight. A past failure holds design conditions; asking for them turns an objection into a contribution.
The quiet idea
Scene. Dilnoza notices that Rustam answers every question first. At the next question she says, 'Take one minute to write, then tell your partner,' and gives Rustam the role of scribe in his four. In the whole-group round, Madina, who has not spoken all morning, reads an idea about using pupils' own explanations from last week's test. Several colleagues write it down. Rustam later says he liked being the scribe.
Insight. A structure changes who speaks without anyone being corrected in public.
The parking lot honours the complaint
Scene. In a Fergana school, a teacher starts a long complaint about a weekly report form. Aziz says, 'This matters. I will put it on the parking lot and we will come back in the last five minutes.' At the end, three teachers volunteer to draft a one-page note to the head suggesting that two sections of the form be removed. The session continues on time, and the complaint becomes a small task.
Insight. Parking a concern with a promise to return respects the speaker and protects the plan.
Common pitfalls
- Answering every comment yourself, so that the group talks to you and not to each other.
- Correcting a talkative or senior colleague in front of the group instead of changing the structure.
- Giving instructions while people are still moving chairs, and not saying the time or the product.
- Using a structure rigidly even when the group needs something else.
The Facilitation Clinic
- Open the Activity Kit: protocol card 1-2-4-All, six situation cards and the observer checklist. Form groups of three: facilitator, participant, observer. (5 min)
- Experience a protocol (10 min): the facilitator runs 1-2-4-All with the whole room on the question 'What makes a pupil explain, and what stops it?' Use 1 minute alone, 2 in pairs, 4 in fours, then 3 whole group.
- Clinic rounds (24 min, three rounds of 8): in each round the facilitator draws a situation card and runs it for 4 minutes with the participant in the role. The observer notes what helped using the checklist; 4 minutes to give feedback. Swap roles.
- Second short activity, Say-Show-Check (10 min): alone, write a three-part instruction for a 10-minute paired task from your own workshop plan. Read it to your trio; the trio says what they would do and how long it would take.
- Whole group and task (8 min): share one phrase that worked. Then write your school-based task from the Kit.
Your facilitator will guide you through this activity in the session.
Questions to discuss
- Which phrase or structure helped most, and which instinct (to argue, to explain more) did you have to hold back?
- Which situation worried you most, and what is your first sentence for it?
- What does a respectful way to handle a colleague with more years than you look like in your school?
Reflect
- When you are nervous in front of colleagues, what do you do? What would you like to do instead?
- Who in your school is respected by others and could co-facilitate with you?
- What do you need to keep confidential about what colleagues say in a session?
Try it tomorrow
- In your next meeting, ask one question and wait silently for seven seconds before anyone answers.
- Use 1-2-4-All on one real question with three or four colleagues and note which usually quiet colleagues spoke.
- Write your reply to 'we tried it and it did not work' in two sentences and practise it aloud once.
Further reading and links
Facilitation is design plus calm: clear instructions, a structure that gives every voice a turn, and a question instead of a rebuke when things get hard.