Workshops designed just for you:

Workshops

The Workshops listed here have been developed by the Self-Help Resource Centre, based on the identified needs of the self-help/mutual aid community and professionals working in the field.

All of these workshops can be tailored to the needs of professionals, those who work with communities, those who want to mobilize communities and the community members themselves who want to start a grassroots project. Contact us for more information or to book a workshop with us in your community.

Workshops to Assist Self-Helpers and Small Community Groups

Self-Help 101: (Almost) Everything You Wanted to Know About Groups
This introductory workshop provides a general overview of self-help/mutual aid groups. You will learn:

  • How to start a self-help/mutual aid group.
  • How to define self-help and how it differs from other types of groups.
  • The benefits and challenges that self-help groups face.
  • The stages a group goes through.

Keeping Your Group on Track
This workshop is designed for members of self-help and community groups who are looking for ways to maintain an effective group. This workshop will help you to:

  • Understand the stages of group development.
  • Explore questions that are key to your group’s success.
  • Learn methods to share responsibilities and deal with difficult situations.
  • Exchange tips to maintain momentum and morale.

Facilitation Made Easy
Learn the components of facilitation including:

  • Why people come to groups and how to motivate them
  • The stages of group development and how to keep people involved and interested
  • Planning and evaluation of groups

Listening Skills
This is an interactive workshop which helps participants fine-tune their listening skills through a series of exercises and discussion. This workshop will help you to:

  • Identify characteristics of “good” listening.
  • Explore the dynamics of listening.
  • Clarify how to establish boundaries.
  • Practice appropriate responses.

When the Going Gets Tough—Dealing with Conflict
Once a group has been going for a while, conflict of one sort or another usually manifests itself in the best run groups. Conflict resolution improves with openness, clear process and practice. This workshop will help you to:

  • Demystify conflict.
  • Explore your personal reactions to conflict.
  • Discuss common conflicts in groups.
  • Review and practice a process of conflict resolution.

Confidentiality
To build trust within a group, each member needs to feel safe and know that what will be shared in the group will stay within mutually agreed upon boundaries. This workshop will help you to:

  • Define confidentiality and anonymity.
  • Know how to develop group guidelines.
  • Learn ways to implement guidelines and what to do when the ‘rules’ are broken.
  • Acquire hands on experience dealing with tough situations.

Self-Care for Self-Helpers
This is an interactive workshop providing ideas about creating a healthy environment. It will assist you to:

  • Define health and the factors that influence our health.
  • What makes a helping organization healthy?
  • Ideas on how to reduce stress and improve morale.

Self-Help, Promotion and Marketing
An interactive workshop, which explores the aspects of promoting and marketing your organization

  • Defines awareness raising, education, promotion and marketing
  • Practical exercises identify marketing strategies of the above four and their outcomes and applicability.

Workshops of Particular Interest to Helping Professionals

Helping You Helps Me: Professionals and Self-Help
This workshop is designed to help professionals understand their role in self-help. The workshop:

  • Defines self-help/mutual aid.
  • Highlights research on self-help.
  • Discusses the role of the professional.
  • How to help groups succeed
  • Resources at the Self-Help Resource Centre

Passing the Mantle—Transitioning Groups from Professional to Member Leadership
This workshop will assist professionals:

  • To educate themselves about self-help/mutual aid
  • To build a Transition Team
  • To let go
  • To evaluate and plan strategically

Popularizing Health Promotion: Self-Help and Health Literacy
This workshop examines how self-help relates to health promotion and:

  • Defines self-help/mutual aid.
  • Compares health promotion and self-help.
  • Discusses strategies for professionals.

Empowerment Against Stress: Get Yourself and Others De-Stressed
This workshop will discuss:

  • What stress is.
  • What happens when we have stress
  • The physiology and psychology of stress
  • How we can empower ourselves and others against stress

Integrating Self-Help Strategies in Your Work.

Self-help groups and peer-led activities enhance social support networks and develop caring communities. This workshop is designed for professionals in the fields of community development, health promotion, social work, and more. We use interactive activities and case studies to help you:

  • identify the principle characteristics, benefits and challenges of self-help strategies.
  • consider different ways professionals can foster opportunities for self-help and peer support.
  • explore strategies to develop self-help/peer support activities, groups, or programs.

Evaluation and Strategic Planning

Steps for Evaluating Your Group
This workshop helps existing self-help groups evaluate their group’s progress in five steps:

  1. Define the ground rules.
  2. See how we are doing.
  3. Discuss how we can improve.
  4. Look at new structures and strategies.
  5. Describe contributions and accomplishments

Strength in Numbers?
This workshop looks at issues of evaluating effectiveness in self-help/mutual aid initiatives. This workshop:

  • Reviews self-help research and methods
  • Explores indicators of success
  • Reviews methods for tracking, capturing data and building success.

Mobilizing Communities

All of these workshops can be tailored to the needs of professionals, those who work with communities, those who want to mobilize communities and the community members themselves who want to start a grassroots project.

Living with Diversity
This workshop is designed to give community members and the public a new perspective on diversity. The workshop focuses on:

  • Our similarities are greater than our perceived differences.
  • What is culture?
  • When cultural scripts differ: developing a new approach.
  • Common areas of cultural diversity.

Reaching out and Planning with your Communities
This workshop is developed for professionals who want to outreach to their communities and the community members themselves who wish to start a grassroots project. In this workshop you will learn:

  • What outreach is.
  • Participatory planning.
  • How to develop effective flyers.
  • How to conduct a needs assessment.
  • How to set goals.
  • How to put it all into action.

Purposeful Networking: Building Partnerships
This workshop is designed to enable community members and those working in communities to understand networking and partnership with community resources, other community members and neighbourhood agencies. In this workshop you will come to understand:

  • What is purposeful networking?
  • Why we should network?
  • Who should be part of your network?
  • The barriers to networking
  • Important things to consider when networking

Running an Effective Community Meeting
This workshop is designed with community meetings in mind. In this workshop you will learn the basics of:

  • What makes a meeting effective?
  • Planning your meeting.
  • Ways to get people involved.
  • When, how and where to meet.
  • Making effective and time efficient agendas.
  • Getting people to return.

Having Fun Raising Funds
This workshop provides guidelines for your next grass roots, small scale, fund raising project. You will learn:

  • How to plan and promote a fund raising project.
  • How to help you identify the internal/external resources needed for your project.

Train the Trainer: How to Lead a Workshop on Starting a Self-Help Peer Support Group in Your Community
This workshop includes a kit in which you will find:

  • How to organize your workshop, things to do.
  • Your workshop notes.
  • Materials to be given to participants at your workshop.
  • Sample guidelines, agendas, communication information etc.

Harmonizing Diversity
This workshop discusses diversity in practice at the organizational level and includes:

  • Diversity from words to deeds.
  • Outcomes as well as process and procedures.
  • Prerequisites for a successful diversity plan.

Communication Skills For Community Organizations
This workshop will help you to:

  • Understand effective communication and identify barriers that prevent it.
  • Learn how your behaviour affects others.
  • Choose words and body language appropriately.
  • Give and receive constructive feedback.
  • Sharpen your listening skills.

Yearning for a Community— Help Yourself to One
This workshop uses the methodology of self-help/mutual aid as a different model of community development and:

  • Defines the community.
  • Identifies elements of an ideal community.
  • Discusses different ways of building a community.
  • Uses group building methods as a model for community development.