* Any views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author and not of Thomson Reuters Foundation.
A succession of budding public speakers stepped into the spotlight in Mozambique’s parliament complex early in July to deliver powerful presentations and take part in challenging debates about effective education. The orators this time were not the usual occupants of the political debating chamber, but 15 parliamentary officials taking part in a practical workshop on designing and delivering compelling training for their teams.
The 15 officials from the Maputo parliament spent three intensive days learning about the theory and practice of effective training, from the science of adult learning to trainer tactics for making workshops stimulating and fun.
Organised by Thomson Reuters Foundation and Westminster Foundation For Democracy, the course aims to equip policy and legal specialists with the hands-on skills to spread their expertise through self-designed learning programmes and workshops for their parliamentary departments.
Many of the delegates were new to the trainer role but they eagerly embraced the craft, coming up with inventive teaching ideas in their group and individual practice sessions. Participants quickly overcame any initial nerves, growing in confidence and creativity as they progressed through the warm-up sessions to the final challenge of delivering individual mini-workshops to an audience of their peers.
Highlights along the way included an activity in which competing groups came up with rap routines – complete with instrumentals – as an exciting way to review a 10-step process for designing effective training in a hurry.
Over the three days the delegates learned how to craft learning objectives at the start of the training design process. They explored ways to cater to different learning styles and picked up tips for using the senses to make learning stimulating and memorable. The step-by-step design framework helped them turn their ideas quickly into highly engaging workshops, reinforced by colourful flipcharts and collages.
The group eagerly explored the many alternatives to traditional lecture-based learning, swapping ideas in brainstorms and classroom debates about the best ways to help team members learn a new skill and put it into practice.
Working closely with this talented group within a new culture in leafy Maputo, the city of acacias, was also a stimulating learning experience for me, the trainer. However experienced you are as a trainer, you can always pick up new ideas and come away with renewed excitement for training when you observe how others tackle the classroom challenge.
Unable to speak Portuguese, I was grateful for the expertise of the excellent translator who conveyed our ideas back and forth. But on another level we were all able to communicate quite effectively without words. The experience made me more aware than ever of the power of non-verbal communication through body language and voice tone, especially for a trainer.
For anyone, even experienced trainers, it can be daunting to stand in the classroom spotlight and then receive constructive feedback on your training efforts, as the participants did in their final workshop challenge. It was a delight to observe the carefully constructed training and the supportive peer feedback offered to each new “trainer” as they delivered sample workshops on topics from parliamentary procedure to folding a paper fan.
I certainly took away renewed energy and a sense of accomplishment. Judging from the final presentations, the delegates also came away with plenty of new ideas and skills. I look forward to an update on the learning programmes to be delivered by this new team of in-house trainers at the Mozambique Parliament.
