Hosting Talking Circles

Visionary Skills Training #1: Hosting Talking Circles

A 1-day training for educators who want to enhance their facilitating skills, confidence and embrace the transformative power of hosting talking circles.

(Season: Autumn, Theme: Embracing Adversity)

Friday 12th November 2021, 9:30am – 4:30pm

What’s on offer?

This one day training, exploring the art of hosting talking circles, kicks off a four-part Visionary Skills Training taking place across four seasons. We start our journey in the Autumn – a time often symbolised by the themes of reflection, introspection, learning to embrace challenges and harvesting the fruits of our labour.

In this training day we develop our ability to host talking circles as a powerful tool to promote self-expression, build compassion and embrace adversity as gateways to healthy individual and collective growth.

Why practice talking circles?

To help build a strong sense of community cohesion and advanced pastoral support
To give space for youth and adults to build authentic relationships
To create interesting, safe and authentic spaces for personal and group expression
Helps participants to develop their ability to reflect on their own experiences, emotions and beliefs
Enhance oracy, communication and listening skills
Learn to accept and embrace conflict as a natural part of life
Help integrate personal and social identities, through reducing cognitive dissonance
Enhance self-awareness and understanding of others

It can feel daunting to open up dialogue with young people about sensitive topics, and yet choosing to ‘go there’ together can be incredibly liberating. Perhaps you see young people struggle with self-acceptance or their self-esteem and you want to better support them? Perhaps you notice they could be more accepting and supportive of one another?

Talking circles offer a powerful gateway to having deeper, more trusting relationships, to young people feeling seen, heard and respected and to creating a shared culture of safety and belonging. Perhaps you see young people bottling everything in and feeling alone with their troubles? Perhaps you simply want to create a safe container to talk about racism, homophobia, rape culture and consent?

Talking circles offer a way to have powerful conversations, creating bonding relationships between young people and adults, and can be used to resolve conflicts or challenges (including challenging behaviour) in the classroom. They help to put into practice many of the values we say we wish to live by e.g. kindness, honesty, respect, compassion, acceptance, courage….

This 1-day practical skills training will leave you feeling more confident in your facilitation skills and fully equipped to bring talking circles (and other similar forms of communication and enquiry) into your education setting.

We’ll walk you through various ‘talking circle’ techniques, practice them together, discuss their different use cases, equip you to run them safely and explore the theory that underpins this powerful practice.

This is for you if…

You work with young people (12-25) in a mainstream or alternative education or youth work setting
You want to support young people to talk about their emotions and topics that really matter to them (e.g. around identity, relationships and culture).
You want to develop your confidence working with mental health, strong emotions, trauma & conflict
You want to learn to relate to young people in ways that alleviate their suffering, support their learning and make them feel cared for and appreciated
You want to be more confident addressing conflict in your life and at work
You teach the RSHE curriculum in school
You are a form tutor, mentor, teacher, youth worker, senior leader
You believe in the transformative power of gratitude, deeper listening and empathy – knowing that an ‘empathy revolution’ is both possible and necessary

You will learn…

How to facilitate different kinds of talking circles
The social and developmental value of talking circles, as evidenced by leading neuroscience and child development theory
How to create a psychologically safe and trusting container
Learn how to look after the wellbeing of everyone in the space – including yourself!
Debunking common myths that hold us back from exploring our emotions and sharing our personal ‘stuff’
The difference between therapeutic spaces and therapy ( and why this isn’t the latter)
How to maintain safe boundaries and key safeguarding considerations, knowing the limitations of talking circles and your role as the guide

NOTE! Whilst the training is geared towards hosting talking circles with young people, the skills and techniques are highly transferable and can be used with groups of adults too. Perhaps you’ll be able to facilitate a talking circle amongst your colleagues!

"There are many things I experienced in this training that I want to take away and apply to my life, apply to my job, apply to everything."
Secondary School Teacher

"Through explaining my own anxieties I realised that often they were unfounded or that a lot of the people I know so well and am close to feel the same way. Max’s workshop really showed me that you never know what someone is going through and creating a space for sharing is the best way to work through this."
17 yr old, talking circle participant

Friday 12th November 2021, 9:30am – 4:30pm

20% Early Bird Discount until Wednesday 13th October

Pricing

We charge on a sliding scale to maximise equity of access. whilst ensuring we cover our costs.

£110 – Standard (pays for your place and covers our costs)

£180 – Abundant (pays for your place and supports another)

£50 – Bursary (subsidised place for those on low-income)*

*please contact hello@thevisionaries.org.uk explaining your situation and to request financial support to attend this training.

Book your place

Facilitators

Nikki Levitan has worked for over 20 years with young people in both formal and informal settings. She is a professional coach and qualified Trauma & Mental Health Informed Schools Practitioner, supporting students and staff to prioritise the wellbeing of each person. Nikki’s dedicated work with young people focuses on their life skills, teaching emotional wellbeing, leadership and positive psychology. She is an expert in creating safe, non-judgemental spaces, working with people to identify and understand their driving values and their strengths.

Sola Adebiyi has over 30 years’ experience of working in and with schools. As a group facilitator his passion is for youth empowerment, creative learning and rites of passage. He is a lead facilitator for LIFEbeat and runs a monthly online African empowerment storytelling showcase; facilitates rites of passage programmes; co-led an inspirational cultural youth charity; is presently lead facilitator in two creative camp-based youth empowerment charities and is a creative entrepreneurial consultant with African school leaders and youth. As a Mythic Medicine Practitioner he describes himself as ‘playfully serious’ and draws on African Martial Arts, Nature engagement, Drumming, Storytelling, Creative Arts, Mindfulness and Visualisation. Sola has facilitated and sat in thousands of talking circles, with children, young people and adults.

Max Girardeau is a Trauma & Mental Health Informed Schools Practitioner and has worked in school development for 6 years since graduating from Year Here, the social innovation fellowship where the idea for the The Visionaries was seeded. He is a qualified Mountain Leader and wilderness rites of passage guide, having trained with the School of Lost Borders. he has extensive experience with The Way Of Council as a form of talking circle, and has been facilitating talking circles with a huge variety of groups for 5 years (e.g. youth circles, boy’s and men’s circles, family circles)