Experiential Training for Psychologists, Therapists, Recovery Workers, Group Facilitators, Couples Therapists, and other healthcare providers. If you have run out of ideas running good old CBT and psychoeducational groups and looking for ways to improve the quality and engagement in your group and couple therapy sessions, experiential training may be the right answer for you.
SIGNS YOU NEED TO SWITCH TO A NEW MODALITY
Are you running group activities and notice a marked decline in interest and participation? Are you frustrated with lack of progress in your clients?
Do your clients find your groups boring, mundane, and repetitive? Do you have to drag them to the group, force them to obey rules, wake them up during the group, and constantly remind them not to interrupt?
Are your therapists or group facilitators experiencing burn out and compassion fatigue? Are they running out of ideas to create more exciting, passionate, invigorating group experiences?
Benefits
Higher client retention, increased motivation and participation of both clients and group facilitators, eliminating treatment fatigue and resistance. Voluntary compliance with rules and norms. Increase in excitement, remembering and applying learned material, eagerness to do more groups and accelerate their growth.
What are the benefits of Experiential Training?
Therapists and group facilitators will learn how to instantaneously engage group participants. They will learn how to switch from a didactic, instructional method of teaching to a more inclusive, participatory group engagement where participants can feel safe and comfortable quickly, are drawn into the group learning from the very beginning, and maintain their level of interest and engagement throughout the entire group activity.
Learning becomes more natural, ingrained, pragmatic, tangible, and much more easily ingrained through experiential learning principles. Group facilitators feel a lot more empowered, appreciated, and instrumental in the learning of the group participants. Trust, safety, connection, attention, participation and follow up become easier to establish and maintain.
Learned outcomes remain with participants for longer duration than other types of group learning.
Learning becomes more natural, ingrained, pragmatic, tangible, and much more easily ingrained through experiential learning principles. Group facilitators feel a lot more empowered, appreciated, and instrumental in the learning of the group participants. Trust, safety, connection, attention, participation and follow up become easier to establish and maintain.
Learned outcomes remain with participants for longer duration than other types of group learning.
What is Experiential Learning?
Experiential learning incorporates sociometry, movement, activities, props, environmental stimuli, and guided group interaction in order to install a continuous level of engagement between group members, which is conducive to establishing a safe, comfortable, and welcoming environment for voluntary learning. Members of a group that engage in experiential learning from the onset of the group are immediately and continually drawn into the group interaction by intriguing their interest, making the group experience relevant to their immediate needs, providing naturally pleasant reasons that stimulate their interest and curiosity.
Very much similar to biofeedback principles where biological feedback teaches an individual how to modify their psychological resources for better outcomes, experiential learning utilizes sociological feedback from the group and environment to help group members refine their psychological faculties for better learning.
For more detailed information about experiential learning, you can refer to the following articles and resources:
List of Resources
- https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-experiential-learning-definition-theories-examples.html
- https://www.brynmawr.edu/swprodev/introduction-sociometry-psychodrama-and-experiential-trauma-group-therapy
- https://www.learning-theories.com/experiential-learning-kolb.html
- https://www.crchealth.com/types-of-therapy/what-is-experiential-therapy/
How much does it cost?
I provide individual as well as group training for healthcare providers of all background and education. Please contact me directly for more information. Please email me with a little information about your facility, group requirements or make up, specific challenges or problems you would like to solve.
- drg92614@gmail.com.
- 949-510-1321
What will your group facilitators learn?
There are over 300 group activities that are available for incorporation and implementation of experiential learning. Based on a preliminary assessment of your needs, company philosophy, treatment goals, client demographics, learning objectives, skillset of therapists and group facilitators, my team and I will create a customized group activity curriculum based on said experiential learning principles using a subset of these 300 group activities. All of these activities are based on empirically developed models by experienced group activity trainers.
Your group therapists and facilitators will be introduced to the core principles of experiential learning, have the opportunity to participate and experience the learning methodology as a group member just like their own clients would in the future, and learn to practice the facilitation of such experiential group activity.
Modality, frequency, duration of experiential training
Based on available time, my team will customize the training sessions to accommodate your needs ranging from a brief training as short as 1 hour in duration to two days of 6-hour-long training days. Training sessions can be held on a weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, or quarterly basis. Handouts will be provided along with props, presentations, and scientific explanations.
Training group size
Each training session can accommodate between 3 and 30 participants. Typical group sizes are 10-12 group members at a time. Larger groups can also be held based on space availability.
Example of group activities
- Rule setting
- Conflict resolution
- Compliance with treatment
- Recovery maintenance
- Siblings Order
- Boundary Setting
- Understanding Trauma
- Trust
- Family dynamics
- And many more...
- Checking-In,
- Dealing with Authority
- Emotional Regulation
- Relapse prevention
- Assertiveness Training
- Codependency
- Shame, & Coping styles
- safety, & confidence
- Freedom, choice, & meaning
- Loss, grief, & resolution
This list is only a very short example of topics. The topics can be limitless.
What’s the difference? A case study: Introductions & Checking In.
Using traditional approaches to group therapy and group activity, therapists or group facilitators may want to utilize very predictable, left-brain oriented, logical methods such as going around the room and asking each member to say their name, their purpose for being present, and some personal information. This approach is quite outdated, predicable, anxiety provoking, and not very exciting.
Using an experiential learning approach that utilizes the room, space, props, and the whole mind-body entity of each member, group participants are guided into a fun easily implementable activity that ultimately leads to a full introduction of all participants. The entire process will be filled with little unpredictable yet comfortable surprising and clever tactics using everyday items we find in our environment, such as pen and paper, pictures, chairs, jackets or scarfs, office supplies, toys, art supplies, etc.
Outcome: every group experience can be adjusted and reconfigured with a new twist to the point that each group activity can take a new shape and form of its own. This way all group activities become pleasant surprising experiences of fun, play, and learning that is put together collectively by the group members.