Create Intercultural and Social Awareneness with this Workshop
This is a ready-made workshop.
It is suitable for any audience above 12 years old.
If you want to jump straight to the free material, scroll down until the bottom of this document.
Workshop: Instructions
Material needed
- The workshop is based on two sessions of 60–90 minutes each, depending on your group size and downtime available.
- A screen/projector and a computer is required.
- A flipchart (or similar) to gather ideas.
Chosen topics for discussion
The chosen topics are based on core pillars for intercultural proficiency. This foundation is defined by exploring the concepts of diversity and equity. The idea in mind is to cover a significant range and broad spectrum of current social issues. It is about showcasing the large variety of challenges that exist beyond our own scope. It’s about creating awareness. Most important, it is not about ranking them. No issue shall be classified, portrayed or perceived as more important than one another.
The topics chosen are the following:
First session
The goal of the first session is to create a common ground regarding intercultural communication.
10 minutes: Discuss with the group what is ‘Intercultural proficiency’.
5 minutes: Discuss the ‘particularism’ and ‘universalism’ approach and different ways that society
Now, split the group in seven teams as diverse as possible.
35 minutes: Focus group. Through a speed-dating system, each team will spend five minutes writing input in these topics:
- What is intercultural communication?
- In which scenarios do they experience it in daily life?
- What are the main challenges in intercultural communication?
- Which tools can they use to improve their intercultural communication?
- How can they bridge a intercultural communication gap?
- What was their biggest mistake in a cross-cultural set-up?
- When do you achieve intercultural proficiency?
15 minutes: Discuss the results in a class-level.
5 minutes: Using the teams selected for the focus group, ask them to pick one of the topics from the workshop: gaslighting, anxious with maths, the secret algorythm of Tinder, cancel culture, ‘can we separate the art from the artist? #MeToo’, culture appropiation and ‘talk about Trayvon. #BLM.
What each team needs to prepare before the second session.
- You will share with each group the slides for the chosen topic.
- Each topic has a number of questions regarding values and ethical dilemmas concerning that subject.
- Each group will do desk research and discuss together creating a presentation. The structure of the presentation is:
- Introduction to the topic.
- Exploration of the subject covering the questions on the last slide of each topic.
- Provide a solution/action-plan to solve the dilemma using both perspectives: universalism and particularism.
- The presentation shall last between 8–12 minutes, depending on your time available.
Second session
- Short introduction to the session recalling the key points discussed in the previous one.
- Each group will present their topic.
- Wrap-up the workshop discussing their new gained insights.
Follow-up
This workshop is only the part of the process to improve cross-cultural communication and a step forward towards intercultural proficiency.
Each group is different. Every person has a different background, has gone through different experiences and also may require different needs. The way to move forward is by continue communicating, sharing and creating platforms for dialogue.
Use the upcoming team meeting or group session to reflect on the past two sessions.
Download the workshop material for FREE
Would you like to use this workshop in your school, university or office?
You can download the workshop slides for FREE through the following link.
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