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What to expect from a Learning Cafe
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Cafe table cloth |
In a cafe with friends over coffee, we often doodle on the tablecloth. New Commons learning cafes are set up with tables for conversation and to record your great ideas. The Process
As a participant you will rotate from one table conversation to another.
A host volunteers at each table to remain behind as other move from table to table.
The host welcomes new people and reviews what the previous group talked about at the cafe table.
You do not need to move as one whole group; you are free to go to what ever question pulls you.
The workshop facilitator will move among the group to help apply the cafe practices
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Tips for Great Conversation
In The Cafe? Everyone Leads and Facilitates
Think of places in your life where you had good conversation: In a cafe with friends over coffee or at a dinner party. Cafes are about natural conversation. Good conversations open our hearts and minds as we respond to each other.
Questions start the cafe conversation, but other questions emerge. Follow the questions that matter to the group, but do stay with the topic.
Record your great ideas right on the paper table clothes' completely and legibly. These "visualized" conversations hold some seeds of answers to your question.
Like a dinner party, everyone leads in a learning caf?. There is no formal visualizer/facilitator at a table. Your table?s host, in addition to participating in the conversation, will help hold the threads of conversation, connect ideas, and encourage you to record the details of the conversation.
The Cafe Sets the Stage for Learning
Cafe conversation starts learning but does not complete it. It can release your passion and you start further inquiry. You may leave with your frontier questions answered, or walk out churning, curious with all kinds of stuff to chew on. Cafes are best for conceptualizing or brainstorming, but not for drilling down to complete an action plan. Cafes are primarily about beginnings and about ideas.
For more suggestions and the full document download here.
Tips inspired by the "World Cafe" of Juanita Brown. Robert Leaver -- from New Commons in Providence, RI ? has been using and experiencing the caf? method for three years.
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