Design to Engage

Facilitators exist wherever learning happens. Anyone who works in a community organization, a corporation, a government, or a healthcare environment can end up leading a workshop, running a course, or otherwise facilitating others’ learning. Facilitators can also be consultants or post-secondary instructors who have been hired to lead one course or more. However, many people haven’t been trained in how to facilitate learning effectively.

Design to Engage is a “how to” book that will help you become an effective designer and facilitator of learning events. You will: – learn about facilitation roles and responsibilities; – discover what good learning experiences look like; – plan for and design effective learning events using practical, straightforward design strategies; – raise your awareness about how to create inclusive, comfortable environments.

Along with specific recommendations on developing the skills and strategies necessary to be an effective facilitator, you’ll find priceless advice on creating participatory activities to keep learners involved, assessing participants’ learning, gathering feedback about learning experiences, and how to grow your facilitation practice. The more engaging and interactive you make your learning events, the more people will actually learn from them.

Practical, accessible, and jam-packed with tools to support facilitators to create impactful learning experiences, Design to Engage is a revelation and an inspiration.

Author Biography

Beth Cougler Blom began her career as a training coordinator and soon became a trainer and then facilitator herself, both as an employee with other organizations and through her own learning design and facilitation business, which she began in 2011. Beth has helped clients, large and small, in all sectors design and facilitate great learning experiences, face-to-face and online.

Beth has been an instructional designer for the teaching and learning centre at Royal Roads University and in the non-profit sector. She teaches learning design and facilitation in publicly-accessible courses through her own business and for select post-secondary and community environments as well as for private clients. In her work for community organizations and higher education institutions as well as for corporations, government, and healthcare, she has discovered how facilitation of learning could be and should be enhanced. Beth lives outside of Victoria, British Columbia with her husband and daughter. Her website is bethcouglerblom.com.