5 Ways to get your Participants out of their chairs and learning

If you deliver training sessions that run for a day or more where your participants remain seated for long periods of time, chances are, they'll get tired, uncomfortable and distracted, and lose concentration. During any training course, unless you're regularly engaging your learners in activities that get them moving, you risk them not absorbing much of the learning, zoning out and even possibly falling asleep.

So what's the solution? Find ways to have them move and get out of their chairs while they're in the process of learning.

Here are 5 great ways to get your participants out of their chairs in your training sessions while they're still learning:

1. Give them clipboards

If you're running a small group discussion activity, give each group a clipboard with paper and a pen and have them stand away from their desks to discuss the topic or questions they've been given. Let them know that they can return to their chairs when they've completed the activity.

Alternatively you can use clipboards for 'interview style' activities where learners are asked to interview each other on a particular topic. Have participants move around the room with a clipboard and interview at least 3 other participants before returning to their seat.

2. Use Flipcharts on walls

If you have an activity that requires your learners to solve a problem or answer some questions, instead of having discussions at their tables, break them up into small groups, place flipcharts on the walls, give each group some markers and get each group to brainstorm their ideas on the flipcharts. They can then present their findings from the flipchart. You may then use these flipcharts to have the groups move around and read the flipcharts from the other teams.

3. "Work station" activities

Another way to get your participants out of their chairs is to have them move to different 'work stations'. Run an activity where your participants, working in pairs or small groups, have to solve certain problems at different 'work stations' throughout the room.

Each team may be required to spend a specific amount of time at each station focusing on the activity at that station. When the time is up, they would move on to the next one until they've worked at each station in the room.

These 'work stations' may be flipcharts on each wall or allocated tables and chairs. Even if you get them sitting at each work station, you are at least keeping them moving between them, which will keep their energy levels up.

4. Surveys across the room

Another great way to get people moving is to use your training room as a communication tool. When you want your participants' opinion on a topic or issue then get them to communicate this physically.

One way of doing this might be using the corners of the room as styles or categories. For example, during a management training course a trainer may allocate each corner of the room as representing a specific management style. She may share a few different scenarios or stories about a team of managers. At the end of each scenario, she may ask the participants to decide what style of management was being used in the story and to stand in the appropriate corner of the room. This visually shows the opinions of the group while getting them out of their chairs. This can result in a very fruitful discussion.

Another way of using the room as a physical communication tool is as a physical rating scale. For example, the trainer may nominate a line in the room as being a rating scale for a particular skill or behaviour with one end-point being 10 (the highest) and the other end point being 0 (the lowest).

As an example, the trainer may then present a dialogue between a customer service staff member and a customer. She may then ask participants to physically stand at the position on the scale that they believe the customer service person's listening skills would be. After discussion of this (while still standing) she may then ask them to move to the position on the line that the customer service person's information providing skills were, and so on.

5. Energizers

Where it is challenging to integrate these types of physical activities into the learning part of the course, we can always incorporate 'energizers'. Energizers are short training exercises that are designed to change the state of the room and help learners shift their thinking and get them ready for the next topic. Many trainers use them to simply re-energize, however, they also be used to add value to the learning process.

For example, if you want to review some content that you've covered earlier, you can combine it with an energizer to maximize the learning outcomes. Try the following:

• Have a set of review questions ready and ask all your participants to stand.
• Using a soft, Koosh ball, throw it to each participant randomly and ask them a review question.
• If the participant gets it right they throw the ball back to you and then get to sit down. But if they don't get the answer right, they throw it back and remain standing.
• Then throw the ball to another participant and ask them the next question.
• Continue this process until everyone is back sitting in their seats ready for the next topic.

These are 5 great ways you can help your participants to remain focused, maintain effective energy levels for learning and keep them active. These are especially important for those difficult times of the day when they tend to get tired, such as the after-lunch lull.

When you keep your learners active, not only will they learn and retain more, but they'll really enjoy your dynamic training.