ALTE
A Learning Team Experience framework
Stage 4 — Closure & Reflection
The last phase is a full-day team activity: the “Graduation Workshop”. Again, the facilitator enables the group to focus on learning, reviewing the knowledge accumulated and closing the learning period and partnership. This stage is a group exercise that lasts for about one day.
The facilitator is to create a ceremonious place that brings some of the elements of a graduation process. The choreography intends to mimic the characteristics of a graduation process:
- Final push
- Final exam or paper
- The emotions of saying goodbye to the class
- The graduation ceremony
This stage is essential as it sets up the group for the next learning period by ending the exercise on a high note.
Graduation Workshop Templates And Facilitator Script
Example One Day Session — Remote Participation
Step 1 — Team Meeting
⏱ 30–60 Minutes
Start the day with a team meeting. Then, help the participants land by doing a check-in.
Check-in exercise: each participant had to change their Zoom background to a photo of their high school or university, then share:
- Tell me about your Zoom background.
- What do you want to take from this learning period?
- For the effort and learnings, I will reward myself with…
At the end of this check-in, the facilitator will instruct the next steps.
Author notes ▼
Participants might struggle with choosing a reward for themselves, partly because it is a surprising question in this context. Even so, they will find the right rewards, and some might even mention that they will choose a small reward because they did not invest as much as they would have liked into their learning goals.
This “reward” question nudges a reflection on their effort in their learning goals. Their answers will sometimes include regret for not dedicating more time or attention to this learning exercise. But, on the other hand, this reflection might motivate them to devote more time to the future learning opportunity that comes along.
Step 2 — Relearning
⏱ 5–6 Hours
The facilitator will give the following instructions. This time is a self-organizing period. Alone, or with your learning buddy, revisit all the learnings (seminars, books, articles etc.) and reflect on the following three questions:
- What have I learned?
- How will I use my newfound knowledge in the next couple of months?
- A year from now, those are the three nuggets of wisdom I want to remember…
Create a 2–3 minute video, with visuals or not, where you present to the whole group your learning on your selected learning goals. You can also have multiple videos per learning goal.
Post your video and/or materials on a shared team space (Confluence page, Google Drive, a Miro board and so on). Your teammates will be able to view the videos or material in their own time. You might have multiple entries — a 3-minute video for each learning goal, a podcast, a Miro board, a PPT deck, a painting and so on. You choose your medium; the only requirement is accessibility to all participants.
Step 3 — Graduation
⏱ 60 Minutes
Back into the group, at the end of the day, the facilitator will create a space where participants honour their learning partner and close the learning period.
Exercise 1: ask each participant to find a metaphor for their learning buddy. The participants will go one by one, ready with their metaphors. If your learning buddy will appear in the newspaper tomorrow, what will be the article’s title?
Exercise 2: ask everyone to go and find a random hat. Ask everyone to throw their hat in the air on a countdown. The facilitator will take a photo and send it later to the participants or post it in the shared digital space.
The ALTE framework was intended to be used as a cyclical-based framework. Searching for anonymous participant feedback can surface future improvements, gauge further interest in a future cycle and nudge participants for a bit of self-reflection.
