1.
Designing Impactful
Educator Workshops
- Our Learning Journey -

2.
Applications and Approach
This toolkit is designed to help organizations execute high-impact, capacity-building
programs to train participants to deliver content, with a focus on facilitation and
activity-based learning.
The Medha Learning Journey has two distinct parts:
1. ‘The Workshop’
○ Multi-day, face-to-face sessions that bring together participants.
○ Optional “refresher” workshops may be offered as needed.
2. ‘The Ongoing Support’
○ Depending on the timeline of your project, provide a few weeks or months of ongoing hand
holding, coaching, and structured feedback to ensure learning objectives are met.
○ Peer networking and best practice sharing to support and accelerate the learning curve.

3.
Learning Journey Timeline
Conduct workshops Ongoing support phase (weeks or months)
New material/program
is developed
Options include, but are not limited to:
● Individual visits from organization for observations and
feedback
● Online peer communication/support
● Offline, in-person participant meet-ups (depending on
geographical distribution of participants)
Implementation begins Conclusion & celebration!

4.
Workshop Objectives
Participants should leave feeling…
● optimistic about activity-based learning and planning facilitations.
● like they understand the next phase - ongoing support.
● capable of working with the new content or curricula on their own.

5.
Meet your
participants
where they are.
Evaluating your group’s starting point is
an essential first step.
To be thorough, do a need analysis survey
prior to the workshop.
Think about:
● Demographics
● Years of experience
● Pre-existing opinions or mindsets
A carefully planned need analysis could
also serve as a pre-assessment survey!

6.
Workshop Flow
Before you enter the ‘ongoing support’ phase, the workshop is your chance to be hands-on with
your participants! When designing your workshops, consider the following:
Opening sessions will:
- Introduce everyone
- Make clear the objectives
- Set community
expectations and workshop
ground rules
- Structure the rest of the
learning journey
- Orient participants to the
new content or curricula
Main sessions will have participants:
- Understanding activity-based learning
and facilitation methods
- Experiencing demonstrations by the
facilitation team
- Working in small groups
- Visualizing activity-based learning in
their own context
- Identifying potential hurdles
- Brainstorming strategies for solutions
Final sessions should:
- Give participants the
opportunity to “teach back”
- Introduce the ‘ongoing
support’ phase
- Include time with other
participants
- Measure growth, improvement
- Summarize learning, debrief
- Collect feedback

7.
Time Breakdown
How much time do you want to
dedicate to each category during
your workshop?
Here’s how we divide our time:
● Facilitation Skills - 30%
○ Methods for facilitating interactive lessons and
implementing activity-based teaching
● Demonstrations from Content - 25%
○ Practice/rehearse how the material will be delivered
○ Can be facilitator-led or participant “teach backs”
● Primary Training - 15%
○ Instruction in elements of the content or curricula the
participants may not be familiar with
● Debriefing - 15%
○ Summarize learnings and reflect
● Laying Groundwork - 8%
○ Setting norms, discussing expectations, investing time
to create a “group culture”
● Activities - 7%
○ Icebreakers, energizers, etc.

8.
Utilizing Small Groups
Participants
The Cooperative Learning Center recommends a
small group size of about 2-4 for a typical classroom
setting.1
3-5
We’ve found that this size enables each member to
get a fair portion of the “talk time.”
Facilitators
Any available staff can float amongst the groups to:
● Answer questions
● Ask probing questions to spur deeper learning
● Guide conversations in the right direction

9.
Takeaways and Tips
Establish a Culture
● Share both facilitator and participant expectations
● Set ground rules collectively
Monitor Energy
● Stagger activities to keep people interested and engaged
● Schedule breaks, energizers with group energy in mind
Avoid Jargon
● Consider group language abilities and adjust accordingly
● Clearly define frequently used terms
Reflect and Debrief
● Curate a reflective environment
● Project or read aloud the day’s activities to help recall

10.
Collecting Feedback Data
We Recommend:
● Writing post-surveys so that the data
can easily be compared to the
pre-survey (need analysis)
● Asking for constructive feedback
about the quality of the sessions and
effectiveness of the facilitators
● Depending on the size of your group,
consider limiting yourself to multiple
choice or qualitative questions only,
for ease of analysis
Example:
I feel capable of making lesson plans
from the given manual.

11.
About Us
Medha is a non-profit organization that
improves employment outcomes for youth.
We deliver 21st century skills training,
on-the-job work experience, and ongoing
placement and alumni support to students
across India.
This toolkit comes from...
Medha’s experience delivering learning
journeys for:
● >100 Medha employees who provide training
and career counseling support to students at
their existing educational institutions
● Existing government faculty members across
ITIs, Polytechnics, and Universities
● Skill training facilitators and volunteers
within NGOs, CSR initiatives, and Skill India
partners

12.
Reach out to Medha’s Capacity Building Team!
Preety Thapa
A passionate and empathetic
facilitator, Preety has over 8
years’ experience and is
certified by the National Skills
Development Corporation.
Shivani Sharma
A valued member of Medha’s
Knowledge Team, Shivani
played a key role in writing
the national employability
skills curriculum.
Neelam Ahlawat
Specializing in state
government partnerships,
Neelam played an
instrumental role in scaling up
Medha’s training program.
Aslam Noor
As a former instructor
himself, Aslam became a
facilitator to incorporate
experiential learning into
mainstream education.
knowledge@medha.org.in

13.
http://medha.org.in/