Carousel

Posted by Karolina Maliszewska from Sendzimir Foundation

TARGET GROUP

Group size

9 – 40

Subgroup size

individual

Is participant experience relevant?

It's okay if participants haven't seen the inside of a classroom in years.

Physical trust needed

Mental trust needed

MATERIALS

Material Description

-flipchart paper
-markers in different colors
-something to attach the sheets of paper to the walls

Create materials quick and dirty

5 min

Create materials with love and care

5 min

REQUIREMENTS

Duration

60 minutes – 2 hours

Experience level of the facilitator

taken part OR some facilitation experience

Location requirements

A room with the possibility to hang/stick flipchart paper in several stations; some empty space to walk around.

CHARACTER OF THE METHOD

Level of activation

calming

Woo-Woo Level – How touchy-feely is this method?

From 1.Rationalist-Materialist “No feelings here, folks.” to 5.Esoteric-Shamanic Bleeding Heart:

Innovation Phases:

• 4 Idea Generation

SHORT DESCRIPTION

This is a facilitation method that serves to deepen the ideas or understanding of a certain issue by a group of people in a short period of time. It can also be used to generate a large number of ideas, alternatives or propositions.

ALTERNATIVE NAME OF THE METHOD

Carousel brainstorming

BACKGROUND

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE

PRE-EXERCISES

You can use an energizer to divide people into groups.

PREPARATION (excluding materials)

You need to have several sheets of flipchart paper, color pens, and something to stick the flipcharts on the walls. Prepare a few sheets of paper (depending on the size of your group, but the optimal number is 3 to 5 sheets) and on each of them write one question/write one topic related to the issue being explored. Stick the sheets on the walls in such a manner that they are at least 3 to 4 meters apart from another. Divide your group into subgroups (the same number as the number of sheets). It would be the best to have from 3 to 8 people in each of the subgroups. It is good to have a recorder/moderator by each of the "stations". Each of the groups uses a pen of a different color and starts in front of a different "station". Each group remains together during the whole exercise.

1 Brainstorm ~ 3-20 minutes

Each group starts in front of one of the "stations" where the participants brainstorm the ideas/answers to the question on a given sheet of paper. The brainstorming should take 3 to 20 minutes depending on the topic and the participants (number, knowledge and experience). The time should be too short for each of the groups to complete the task. All the ideas should be recorded on the flipchart by a recorder/moderator (he or she can be one of the group members).

2 Rotate

After the given time the facilitator asks all the groups to move to a different "station" taking their pen with them. The recorder/moderator or the member of the group that played this role stays behind and explains to the newcomers the work that his or her group did. The arriving group adds their ideas to the list and they switch to another station. The time spent at each of the stations should decrease.

3 Keep rotating

The rotation ends when all groups get back to their initial stations and are able to read all the outcomes of the exercise.

HARVEST

All the groups read the ideas on all the sheets.

FURTHER INFORMATION

EXAMPLES

This method is good for working on related topics - the questions can look at a certain issue from diverse perspectives. The topics should be quite broad, for example: "The challenges of communicating sustainable development to local officials are…" or "Getting sustainable development to the policy priority list of the local government demands…" etc.
It can also be used for efficiently building understanding. The first group can work on a certain proposal and then all the other groups can get a better understanding of each proposal and comment on it.