Utilizing partners and small groups during training is one of the keys to making it interactive and fun. Here are three different ways to mingle participants to create new groups and promote interaction:
- Hand out a playing card to each person at the beginning of a session and then group them in a variety of ways during the day. For four groups, you can use the four suits. For two groups, divide them into red and black, or number and face cards. You can have them find a partner by pairing odd and even numbered cards.
- Have individuals choose a different animal card at each table. These cards can simply be index cards with the name of an animal written on them. To regroup the entire room, put all of the same type of animal at the same table (e.g. all rabbits at one table, all alligators at another, etc.). To put the group into four teams, try categorizing the animals into mammals, amphibians, insects, and birds. For partnering they would have to find an animal of a different species from a different table.
- Put a colored dot on the name tag or handout of each participant. Groups can be formed by putting all of the people with the same colored dot at a table. Another grouping would have one dot of each color at the table. To partner you could have red dots paired with blue dots and green dots paired with yellow dots.
