Serious Play Forum

[Jon Trevor]

Hi All
I am just starting to experiment with Serious Play. I could do with some practical advice. Here are a load of questions:

Do you mix all your sets together, or do you keep the Landscape and Identity kit separate from the Connections kit, or mix it all in together?
Likewise, do you keep your Starter kits separate?
Do you introduce the bits of kit separately during a facilitation day, or do you throw it all on the table together for people to help themselves?
How do you transport your LSP kit and keep it secure?
Any other practical tips and advice you have learnt?

thanks in advance for any useful advice you can give

Jon

[Maureen ennis]

Hi John,
The most important sorting that I find, is to keep the Starter kit pieces separate from the landscape, connections and any other surplus. Getting people started well and without confusion is critical success factors as our LSP mentors knew well when designing the process.

When I complete an engagement I take all of the leftover starter kit pieces, bring them home, sort and recreate the pieces necessary to do the warmup exercises in individual containers to use the next time.

The others I sort well in nice organizing bins that often come with the landscape and connecion kits….and stack them in a fabric (recyclable) grocery bag. Size seems to be perfect for keeping them stable. Then I take them out to use as store.

Hope this helps:) Good luck as you embark on new biz.

[Joyce Miller]

Hi Jon, did you do a facilitator training on the use of LEGO Serious Play? These kinds of issues are normally well covered. If you haven’t done a recognized training, I would highly encourage this. You will get informed about practical issues as well as inspiration and insight for using the method and materials. All the best, Joyce

[Marcos Cedillo]

Hello Jon,
here my two cents on what works for me on my workshops.
– I keep separate the starter kits in order to supply one by participant on my next workshop. Eventhough I usually do that, I have had times when i decide to mix all of them and place them at the center of the table for self serve, that works too when you are short one or two kits to the number of participants.
– when I use the exploration bag, for instance, i introduce it separately for the part of the workshop we will be using it. and this kit I always keep it separate, I use small ziplock bags.
– to transport the material, I use a big suitcase so everything is inside and i can easily carry it from my car to the room where the workshop will be, I also have a couple of plastic lego organizers for the tiny little things, I carry them in the suitcase too.

unfurtunately in LSP the handling of material and transportation is not so practical as we would wish, so I believe we will always be looking for better ways to make it easier for us as facilitators!.
I don’t complain… I look at sorting as a playtime with my son! :)
greetings!
Marcos

[Marko Rillo]

Jon,

Welcome to the Serious Play community! I agree with Joyce – at most LSP facilitator training sessions those questions are dealt with thoroughly.

Anyway – it depends on an actual session. In most cases I do one day of a simple session where we start off with Window Exploration Bags or Starter Kits. If it is a quick warmup then I let people keep the Window Exploration Bags. However, for more serious starter I hand out the Starter Kits, which I request to repack. I thereafter usually continue with whatever training. The warmup exercises are separate from work with larger kits.

Thereafter I frequently bring Landscape and Identity Kit mixed with Connections Kit for a more serious group-work. This large kit is packed in such a manner that most of the smaller items are kept within assorted trays and most bricks, duplos, animals, pillars etc are just kept either in large piles or storage boxes where people can rummage around to identify the most suitable items.

For storage boxes the most adequate solution I have found is this one produced by Lego: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0085Y3LKE/?tag=seriousplay-20 – they work well. One of those is spacious enough to house bricks for a pretty large group – e.g. you can fit your landscape kit together with connections kit comfortably in 5 of those storage boxes and these boxes can be operated more comfortably than the original cardboard boxes of the Landscape and Identity Kit and Connections Kit.

The storage boxes close with a nice ‘click’, which makes them safer to transport around – they don’t fall apart even when one should fall on its side. They have small holes in the bottom – i.e. you may comfortably wash the bricks after use and leave them for drying.

For trays I mostly use those: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00006IA5D/?tag=seriousplay-20 – in terms of measurements they fit perfectly on top of the storage box and the slots are comfortable to fit small items.

Hope it helps and good luck with your next steps!
Marko

[Jon Trevor]

thanks, all. very helpful.

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