Positive, practical techniques for achieving a more professional writing style. Here are the ¿how to¿ keys of writing¿from putting the first words on paper to the final polishing and proofreading. Readers will learn how to edit their writing for improved clarity, cut excess words, use transitional phrases, recognize and correct run-on sentences and overcome procrastination and impulsive writing. Readers will learn how to: ¿ Identify the key components of any well-written business document ¿ Cut excess words and phrases from your writing ¿ Use transitional words and phrases ¿ Avoid misplaced and dangling modifiers and split infinitives ¿ Use commas, semicolons, colons, dashes, and parentheses ¿ Use slash marks, ellipsis marks, quotation marks, italics, and brackets ¿ Recognize and correct run-on sentences ¿ Proofread your writing for clarity of meaning ¿ Overcome the two common writing problems that waste time and money¿procrastination and impulsive writing

A one-stop shop to answer your most pressing questions about what it takes to facilitate. Workshops, committees, teams, and study groups are a regular part of an educator's professional life, and any educator can find themselves in the facilitator role, with a responsibility to aid the group in achieving its goals. The Effective Facilitator's Handbook is here to help. Professional development expert Cathy A. Toll has written a guide for busy facilitators, starting with four simple rules for successful facilitation: listen, start with the end in mind, lead with productive tools, and stay organized. The processes, tools, and templates in each chapter are easy to apply and offer advice about how to create a welcoming environment, set the right tone, understand the group's dynamics, improve communication, and more. This book walks you through the unique purposes, pitfalls, and needs of specific types of groups, whether it's a professional development workshop, a committee focused on one decision or problem, a team that regularly collaborates for student success, or a study group learning about a specific issue. But Toll also considers the bigger picture and connects the patterns behind different types of facilitation skills that will serve you in a variety of situations and settings. As an effective facilitator, you'll be able to increase the value of group time, foster engagement, and help teachers improve their practice so that they can bring their best to the classroom each day.

Co-published with How can I apply learning and social justice theory to become a better facilitator?Should I prepare differently for workshops around specific identities?How do I effectively respond when things aren’t going as planned?This book is intended for the increasing number of faculty and student affairs administrators – at whatever their level of experience -- who are being are asked to become social justice educators to prepare students to live successfully within, and contribute to, an equitable multicultural society.It will enable facilitators to create programs that go beyond superficial discussion of the issues to fundamentally address the structural and cultural causes of inequity, and provide students with the knowledge and skills to work for a more just society. Beyond theory, design, techniques and advice on practice, the book concludes with a section on supporting student social action.The authors illuminate the art and complexity of facilitation, describe multiple approaches, and discuss the necessary and ongoing reflection process. What sets this book apart is how the authors illustrate these practices through personal narratives of challenges encountered, and by admitting to their struggles and mistakes.They emphasize the need to prepare by taking into account such considerations as the developmental readiness of the participants, and the particular issues and historical context of the campus, before designing and facilitating a social justice training or selecting specific exercises. They pay particular attention to the struggle to teach the goals of social justice education in a language that can be embraced by the general public, and to connect its structural and contextual analyses to real issues inside and outside the classroom. The book is informed by the recognition that “the magic is almost never in the exercise or the handout but, instead, is in the facilitation”; and by the authors’ commitment to help educators identify and analyze dehumanizing processes on their campuses and in society at large, reflect on their own socialization, and engage in proactive strategies to dismantle oppression.

This book shows what makes a group effective and how a facilitator can improve group effectiveness by identifying patterns of behavior that are getting in the way, helping the group stick to a few critical ground rules, and encouraging them to deal more openly with conflict. Approx.

This is a lucid and helpful assessment of the state of outdoor education today, with an important focus on how differing individuals and groups may learn from outdoor experiences.

Effective Small Group Communication in Theory and Practice combines discussions of theory with practical applications in order to ease and enhance reader comprehension.