1

There is Yoshi Oida, my incomparable teacher of Noh and Kabuki theatre and erstwhile collaborator of Peter Brook, who taught me to keep focusing on the framework, format, structure, choreography even, of the activity I am offering to the participants - and not on the content. As a consequence, the facilitator keeps a lot of open space 'inside' her - some kind of inner void, which allows for the participants' imagination to enter, and where they can make up their own stories, store their own knowledge and skills, let emerge their own insights about the training content, and grow and nurture their own emotional and attitudinal learning outcomes.

2

Here is another thing that I learned from 笈田ヨシ Oida Yoshi San, something that profoundly changed my work as a trainer and a facilitator. Or rather, this is a teaching from Kyūi (Nine Levels), a classic by 世阿弥 元清 Zeami Motokiyo, the famous aesthetician, actor, playwright, educationalist and Zen Master of the 14 century AD.

That all learning is divided into an internal fundamental structure and an outside phenomenon, between tai and yu. If tai is the flower, yu is the scent. If tai is the moon, yu is the moonlight. As a trainer or a facilitator or an instructional designer, if we focus on tai (the fundamental structure), then yu (the outside expression) will emerge automatically. If we work with yu, without understanding its tai, our work will have no meaning.

If we make our trainees and workshop participants copy yu, without understanding its tai, our work will have no meaning. Tai is for us to offer. Yu will come after.
It took me a whole lot of time to really understand this.

And look, at last, now, when it is almost too late for me, I like imagining that I understand better today than I did yesterday.

3

Another thing about being a good facilitator and trainer, that I learned from Yoshi Oida, the celebrated Noh and Kabuki teacher, is how immersion is much more important than preparation. This is why I often discourage my student trainers and facilitators from preparing their courses or classes or workshops too much. Don't lose time studying the lines or where on the stage to move, Yoshi Oida San would say. Instead: immerse. Read books, talk to people, look at photos, enjoy art, go out, visit the landscape, sit in a village square, be 'in' the workplace, smell the surroundings, sing songs, recite poetry, cook and eat. Textbooks are just the tip of the iceberg. Explore what is normally left unnoticed beneath the surface. If you do this first, what you need to do and say while on the job, will simply emerge.

DAY 1

1 space
2 people
3 objectification with images (two rounds)
4 review in break-outs
5 review in plenum
6 kishotenketsu video
7 review
8 bloom-based learning theory
9 jamboard activity
10 bloom analysis
11 review

LUNCH

12 I bet you didn’t
13 game review
14 break
15 different video breakout
16 kishotenketsu
17 Q&A format
18 moodboards
19 retro 11 to 55
20 conclusion

DAY 2

1 space
2 people