Abstract

Imagine you’re a student beginning a collaborative project with other courses. You don’t quite know the objectives, there are lots of new people, and you wish you were working on your passion project. You enter the space and BAM, ice breaker. But not any old ice breaker… A tennis ball flies at you – what’s your favourite colour? If you were an animal, what would you be? Confused by the purpose, you answer the questions and sit in relief that at least it’s over with. As Changemakers and Climate Advocates at CSM, we have spent 6 months immersed in research about caring collaborative practices. We invite you to embark on a collaboration with us in this session, where we will offer warm-up activities and our newly launched zine that has emerged from our time together.

Session and activities

In ‘Warming Up Not Breaking Ice’, we explore how we can best equip students for group work, embed effective tools and activities to aid their process, and provide clear intentions and expectations for both staff and students.

So, how can we create a warm welcoming environment when our tools can feel cold? What tools can best equip students for collaboration? As a facilitator, how can you build purposeful and meaningful engagement? How can focused tasks and games replace ice-breakers?

We will offer short parallel activities on our areas of interest  that emphasise care processes in a collaborative project. For each activity, participants will be led through a short collaboration. After the activities, we will offer panel reflections on our collaborative process, and then open up for questions and reflections.

Join us, before like birds our students seek warmer educational climates.