S’Mores Campfire

Café

Putting conversations to

work

“It's never enough just to tell people about some new insight. Rather, you have to get them to

experience it in a way that evokes its power and possibility. Instead of pouring knowledge into

people's heads, you need to help them grind a new set of eyeglasses so they can see the world

in a new way.”

˜John Seeley Brown

What is a World Café?

• A powerful method for engaging people in conversations that matter?

• An approach that grew out of a 1995 rainstorm in California?

• A gathering of people who share ideas, insights, and listen to each other actively?

• A dynamic activity during which I get to doodle on the tablecloth if I want?

IT’S ALL OF THE ABOVE

“Since our earliest ancestors gathered in circles around the warmth of a fire, talking together has been our primary means for discovering common interests, sharing knowledge, imagining the future, and cooperating to survive and thrive.”

The World Café Foundationhttp://www.theworldcafe.com/

So let’s gather around our respective campfires at S’Mores Campfire Cafe and talk.

Here are the guidelines for your conversations:

• Pretend you’re in a local café talking with your group. • Keep the conversation relaxed. You’re not competing

here; you’re listening, commenting, building on others’ insights.

• Get everyone in your group involved, even if someone’s participation is mostly listening.

• Listen together for patterns and insights that emerge from your discussions.

• When you move to another table, take your insights from the first table with you.

• Use the opportunity to bring about a meaningful discussion.

• Recognize that your group, working as a whole, is likely to come up with insights (“aha moments”) you may not have thought of alone.

• Talk among your tablemates until you are signaled to move to another table.

• One of you will stay behind as “table host” at each table, while the rest (“visitors”) move on.

• Table host briefly reviews what his first group came up with for the new visitors.

• Feel free to doodle or draw on the paper on each table.

• Someone serves as recorder for each group to write the top ideas your group comes up with and writes them on the index cards.

Last-Minute Instructions

• You’ll have 15 minutes to meet around your first campfire, so get the discussion going right away.

• At the 15-minute mark you’ll hear a signal to move to another campfire; your group members go to different campfires.

• A signal will be given at the end of the second 15-minute campfire discussion.

• The group as a whole will debrief.

WRAP-UP

• Discuss themes that emerged from a number of groups.

• Identify insights (“aha moments”) anyone gained.

• Talk about how this method (World Café) might be useful in your local situations.

• Hear about how the group discussions will be shared with participants.