Blog - Page 9 of 10 - Constructivist

October 15, 2021October 15, 2021

Making online workshops better for humans

18 months since the pandemic started people are tired of working online. But online work has become a necessary part of modern work. So how do we make sure our online workshops are engaging productive, productive and worthwhile?

That’s what our ‘how to run a great online workshop online workshop‘ is here for. Today we kick off a new series of this delivery programme for one of our partner clients. It’s training that we run for in-house teams to help bring the online workshop experience alive.

This workshop combines so many of the things that motivate us at Constructivist: bring people together, finding the humanity in our work and working with the world as it is to bring about better outcomes.

April 26, 2021April 26, 2021

New alumni group for Training After Declaring

Image of participants in a workshop called Training After Declaring a Climate Emergency

News is we’ve launched an online alumni group for people who have attended our course ‘Training on what to do after declaring a climate emergency’. One of our aims for the course is to create a community of peer support for people who are trying to make organisational change in the climate emergency.

So far two cohorts of trainees have completed the course, and we will be launching our third cohort later in the spring. With the launch of the alumni network we are bringing together these two cohorts so that they can start to provide each other with mutual support.

The training is for people who been handed the task of figuring out what to after their organisation has declared a climate emergency. It is also for people who are trying to figure out how to get their organisations to make that declaration.

January 21, 2021January 21, 2021

Sir Misha Black Award for Innovation in Design Education

I am really excited and honoured to share with you the news that I have just been awarded one of the 2020 Sir Misha Black Awards for Innovation in Design Education. The Award commemorates the life and work of design and architect Sir Misha Black. It was created in 1999 to honour the exceptional work of a teacher, team, department, or course within or between educational establishments in the UK.

September 14, 2020April 26, 2021

Trainee feedback: training on what to do after declaring a climate emergency

We asked members from our first cohort of ‘Training on what to do after declaring a Climate Emergency‘ participants what they thought of the course and why other people should think about going. Here are some of the things they said.

The support of the group alongside discussion of change models and tools was transformative in developing insight on how I can make positive change and resolve to take action. I would highly recommend it to those seeking to develop personal or organisational strategies in response to the climate emergency.
Julia Ratcliffe – Director – Scale Consulting

September 10, 2020September 10, 2020

Zoom magic tricks

Today I’m working with Nick Francis to develop some playful breakout activities for a conference. Here’s what we came up with.

September 10, 2020May 1, 2024

Designing your learning process – week one of IDBE

At Constructivist we talk lots about models for learning and also about models for understanding design. In this workshop we are combining the two: thinking about how to design your learning process. It’s my contribution to week one for a new cohort of students on the Cambridge Masters programme Interdisciplinary Design for the Build Environment.

September 8, 2020May 1, 2024

The Return of Training on what to do after declaring a Climate Emergency

It’s been a year since many engineering and construction firms declared a climate and biodiversity emergency. Six months since the pandemic struck. But the climate clock is still ticking and the world is still heating. Are we one tenth of the way we need to get to in this decade to avoid the worst kind of climate breakdown?

In hindsight, making the declaration is the easy part: the difficult part is knowing what to do next. That is why we created the course ‘Training on what to do after declaring a Climate Emergency’. It recognises that the emergency status is a new operating paradigm for most organisations, and that within those organisations there will be individuals and teams whose job it is to work out how to respond. We created this course to support those people.

August 27, 2020August 27, 2020

Guided Q&A versus guided plenary

I’m writing a quick post here to share a response I am providing to a recent attendee of our online facilitation course. The question relates to two of the four facilitation modes that we teach: Guided Q&A and Guided Plenary.

May 13, 2020August 30, 2020

All online for an introduction to conceptual design

This month our face-to-face and webine cohorts for our Introduction to Conceptual Design for Structural Engineers course joined to form one online group, enabling us to deliver to both groups despite lockdown.

The course splits conceptual design up into three phases: establishing the brief, creative thinking and convergent thinking and provides simple models for understanding each of these phases.

February 3, 2020February 3, 2020

Constructivist Creativity Reading List

This is the Constructivist Creativity Reading List. These are the books and book chapters that have changed the way I think about creativity and that inform the training that we do at Constructivist. Where a book relates to a specific course, I have made that link, but most of these books are generally applicable. I’ve also linked in other articles I’ve written about these topics where relevant.