Time Sponge - Three Card Draw - A technique To Help Participants Reflect & Be Engaged
Or what to do in a training not to get bored if you are fast....
It happened to me many times either when I knew about a topic of a training I was a participant in and I was getting bored or when I actually had the situation that the information came to me too fast and I needed to take time to reflect.
It is important to give choices to your participants - some are not getting bored easily, but some need action, and brain stimulation.
So how do you actually give everyone what they need?
What is Three Card Draw and how can you use it?
Three Card Draw is an exercise I found in the book “Brain Science To Make Training Stick” by S. Bowman and I experienced it in the “Training from the back of the room” as a participant first time.
Get three cards and write this one of them:
card 1: What? What have you learned about this topic?
card 2: So What? Why is this information important to you?
card 3: Now What? What is one way you might use this information?
How can you use them?
✍️ Reflect & Summarize content: We learn better through reflecting on what we experienced, read, and so on. So taking a moment and after each content segment of training to reflect what did you learn and where you can use it is a good way to send the information into the long-term memory. You can use this for different settings, writing about facts, opinions, questions, comments, major ideas, resources, procedures, summary statements, etc. You can give this from time to time as an optional activity so that the participants who finished faster or want to get to the next step while the others still work on something can just use this activity like a “time sponge”. Visualize it in drawings if possible. Drawings help the brain to memorize better as well.
✍️ Movement and share variations: They can do this activity in silence or as soon as another person did it as well, to pair up and share their cards. They also move from one place to another or walk and talk which helps the brain to focus even more.
✍️ Wrap-it up: If you use these cards make sure you take the time at the end of the training to invite the participants to share them so that everybody gets inspiration from them and has another occasion to go through that specific content.
One-phrase summary:
How can one activity be also a “time sponge”, an opener, and a closer?
Use the three-card draw activity adapting it to your session and your participants. It is so versatile!
Resources:
Book: “Using brain science to make training stick” by Sharon Bowman
Want to experience brain-based training with engagement throughout the whole time?
Check out the training “Neuroscience Behind Facilitation” on the 31st of August!