Venue: 7th Feb 2010: Anugrah, Herbertpur.
Participants: Vineet, Amaan, Pawan, Raju, Nishu and Sachin.
Nishu had brought a lot of news paper cuttings. These were given to participants- they studied them for 5 minutes and then made a 3-4 minute presentation on their own (no looking down at the piece of paper) – and then, gave their”critical” opinion- standing in the centre of the room, with no lectern to hide behind. Later on, sachin / pawan asked them questions too. Most participants used bouncing, pausing or prolongation during presentation.
As we discussed later- the focus was not just on communicating the content effectively but also developing “critical thinking skills”. There was a news item from Tiuni, about shortage of water and villagers protesting. So, Pawan asked the presenter: do you agree with the villagers’ reaction? If the Water supply officials fail to act- what else could villagers do? More protest? boycott elections? self help? why? In other words, dont just share information, but take a stand for or against, think deeply and then argue back- all, very CALMLY.
R has a tendency to give others negative feedback, unasked. Sachin checked him and explained to him some golden rules about giving feedback (for ex. never give feedback unless the other person asks for it at least thrice! Give at least 5 positive feedback for one negative..etc.).
Then, we shared Ti-ger analogy and did some voluntary stuttering. R is a rooky. His third visit only. So he had some questions about voluntary stuttering. Pawan and sachin discussed it at some depth. About three hours had passed before we called it a day, after lot of fun.
