Brain in Business

Hi there

I always enjoy the BFLG meetings, and never fail to be struck by everyone's friendliness and generosity of ideas.

I asked for some new ideas for a writing skills course - Report Writing. Here are the ideas that came forward (which include some that I am already doing):

- Mind mapping to plan report

- Gallery of writing tips. Participants encouraged to walk round at the start of the course and to say what was of interest/value to them in the room

- Main parts of a report (Introduction, Main Body, Conclusions, Recommendations & Appendix) - what does each sound like?

- Key principles of report writing: each part of process on a tag attached to helium balloons, hung round a blow-up animal or hung on a "washing line"

- Metaphor - get the participants to come up with a metaphor for report writing

- Scissors - actually get them to use scissors to cut waffle out of sentences and to cut up long sentences into shorter ones

- Process of report writing on cards jumbled up - participants to put in order and to discuss how long to spend on each part of the process

- Musical statues (with "islands" representing different stages of writing a report) - identify the rules for each step or a song that represents each step

- Passive to active exercise using people

- Top tips on writing reports using smelly pens, in debrief ask which set of tips smells best

- Conclusion/review with a ball thrown to different individuals - dos and don'ts

- ABCDs at end: Achievements, Benefits, Concerns and Do next

Thanks to everyone for their ideas. Some of these I am already using, and I'll report back in a few weeks with new ideas that I've incorporated and how it all went.

Janet

Hi Janet,

Just wanted to say that even though I was not part of your group on Friday (I was busy getting my head around TTT for Technical bods) I listened to your recap with great interest.

Loved the ABCD idea at the end of training (Thank you to whoever came up with one!)

I also know that my next training session will end with "I went on a course today and I learnt.......etc etc"!

Look forward to hearing how you got on with these and all the other ideas...... good luck with it!

Tracey

HI Tracey,
I love the 'I went on a course today and I learnt....'

I presume that works a bit like the old game of 'my mother she went to the market and she bought..' and then everyone has to remember what the person before said.

You may recognise this activity later this week when you're at How to be a Brain Friendly Trainer with us.

And thanks go to Janet for the ABCD idea - we all liked that one.

Enjoy your week everyone.
STella

Hi Tracey

Thanks for your comments. Glad you liked the ABCD - and that one was mine and one I use a lot - works well!

Janet