LAUNCHING THE DIALOGUE

After your introduction, it is time to let the participants meet one another in a formal way. Typically, the task of facilitators prior to the official start of a dialogue is to mingle, welcoming people and introducing them to one another. If you know some of the participants and can introduce them in such a way that they connect up with others with shared interests or concerns, participants can begin making connections even before this official period for introductions. The most successful dialogues are those in which people get an opportunity to chat before the official start of the dialogue.

If your group is larger than about 15 people, you may want to break the group down into a smaller size for introductions as you do not want to use the entire time to have people introduce themselves.

You might want to consider building introductions into the introductory activity as it is generally not very effective to simply go around the room and tell their name, year in school and major. The Sample Introductory Dialogue asks for people to talk a little bit about their service work in relation to a few thumbnail sketches of mythical students and their work. This serves to give participants a chance to introduce themselves and talk a bit about themselves even while moving the purpose of the dialogue forward.

This resource guide has a number of ideas for Introductory Activities available for your review.

Typically immediately following the introductions is the prompt for the dialogue. The prompt is what you are using to focus the conversation. It may be something as simple as a careful restatement of the question, topic or issue or it may be as complicated as a panel presentation, a film or video, or a dramatic presentation. Whatever you use to provoke the thinking of participants, make sure that you conclude this section by clearly stating the issue or question for discussion as neutrally as possible, inviting people to share their points of view.