Hello Friends,
Greetings from Toronto ❄️where I am visiting with family and friends for the first time in 3 years😍. Jetlag has finally caught up to me. More on that below👇
🙌Many thanks for reading The Quest. A special shout-out to Gillian in Kingston, Maria in Miami, Connie in Toronto, Barry & Michaele in Toronto, and Chris in Belgium.
If you are joining for the first time, welcome to our deep dive into all things creativity, facilitation, and learning.
You can catch up on the last edition 🎉How to create online parties that are even better than in-personand all past editions here.
🤔Call me an online whiteboard skeptic.
If you have used online whiteboards, you may be familiar with the following scenario:
✔️You share the instructions
✔️You share the link
❌Someone can’t access the board
❌The link is not working
❌Your session has turned into a frustrating tech troubleshooting nightmare
The session is over. You didn’t even get to do the activity.
I have been in and I have led sessions like this one.
It always led me to ask:
Are whiteboards worth it?
Then Quest reader, course creator, and designer JP King showed me the potential of whiteboards. He helped me to develop an experience design tool for my course Breakthrough Facilitation. He used online whiteboard tool Miro.
That experience completely changed my understanding of what online whiteboards make possible. I learned that whiteboards can boost collaboration. They harness visual learning. They unleash non-linear thinking. Whiteboards are a container for focusing ideas, reflections, and moving projects forward.
I learned that online whiteboards take some practice. They need to be skillfully woven into the design of your session. I am nowhere near being a Miro pro – yet. But I have finally seen the online whiteboard light.
Online whiteboards are evolving quickly. And they are fast becoming and indispensable tool in every virtual facilitator’s toolkit.
How do whiteboards work, and how can you use them for better outcomes in your sessions?
That’s our quest for this week🔎
👉What is Miro? Two videos to get you started
👉3 Tips for using Miro like a pro
👉3 free facilitation whiteboard templates that will rock your next session
Let’s dive right in!
💭What is Miro? Here are 2 videos to get you started.
There are a lot of online whiteboard tools out there. You can read about them in Zapier’s The 7 best online whiteboards in 2021.
I can easily get paralyzed with too many choices. So I have decided to focus on learning one well. And that’s Miro.
Just to be clear. I don’t work for Miro. I’m not affiliated with Miro. I like it because it’s easy to use. They offer a free version. Your participants don’t need a Miro account to use it. And you can access a bank of community-generated free templates in Miroverse.
If you haven’t used Miro before, here are two videos that will help get you started:
💡Pro Tips for Using Online Whiteboards
Here is some golden advice that JP King gave me that will help set your participants up for success with virtual whiteboards. See the post on twitter.
What helps you get the most out of virtual whiteboards?
3 Free Facilitation Whiteboard Templates That Will Rock Your Next Session
This month, Hyper Island, one of my go-to sources for facilitation activities and online collaborative tool Miro teamed up to make it easier for facilitators to use whiteboards. They created a series of free whiteboard templates complete with descriptions and instructions.
Here are three that I am excited to try out:
1. I Like, I Wish, I Wonder
An activity that helps teams collect feedback quickly.
Get the Miro Template 👉here.
2. Stinky Fish
A short activity focused on sharing fears, anxieties, and uncertainties. It helps create openness within a group.
Get the Miro Template 👉here.
3. Rose, Thorn, Bud
One of my favorite facilitation activities, Rose, Thorn, Bud uses a rose as a metaphor for understanding what is working, what’s not, and areas of opportunity for a specific problem or topic.
Get the Miro Template 👉here.
Get more templates and tips in the Hyper Island blog post here 👉Exploring the Collaborative Benefits of Online Whiteboards.
🎟️Free EduCaixa Workshop on Motivating Students **En Español**
Calling all Spanish-speaking teachers and educators!
It’s not too late to join EduCaixa’s free virtual workshop on motivating students (in Spanish).
I’m thrilled to be joining a stellar panel of speakers sharing research and best practices including:
- Miguel Pimentel from the Education Endowment Foundation
- Jorge Fernández teacher and founder of the blog Investigación Docente
Inscríbate aquí 👉 https://educaixa.org/es/-/aprendizaje-dialogico
📷Photo of the Week
The Toronto skyline from the rooftop of my mom’s apartment building at 5:30am.
💌Thanks for reading The Quest
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Creatively yours,
