I was reflecting with a few facilitators on how to handle a difficult situation in a workshop. One facilitator shared a quote – ‘Miracle happens before and after.’
It is so true. To me, the quote means a lot more than what it appears to be. It is not really that it does not matter what we do in the workshop. Instead, a lot of the difficult situations in workshops can only be resolved before or after the events.
My experience this Oct and Nov perfectly illustrated this (fortunately or unfortunately). First, I had a great time with a group of Korean learners. They were positive, curious and hardworking. However, 2 weeks later, I ran a workshop with some learners who were quite wrongly put into it. They are good people but in short they did not see reason why they should be there. And worse, their disengagement became contagious to the others. Despite our repeated effort, the outcome was still far from satisfactory.
Really, miracle happens before and after. Not that it becomes an excuse for all facilitating well. But more that I should not be too disturbed by some disengaged learners and thus miss to work with the engaged ones. Of course, another question is what I can do for the ‘before’ and ‘after’.
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