Article: Once everyone is seated, you will have to orient them to your workshop. Be sure to tell them your name and what they should call you. Give a few words about why you should be considered an expert in the topic and what got you interested in it. Explain to your participants what the goal of the workshop is and why it is important. It is also a good idea to give a rough outline of how the workshop will be run so that they can be prepared. Try to limit this segment to just a couple of minutes.  Even if your topic is a serious one, consider using humor to lighten the mood and get everyone comfortable with one another. Explain to your participants what the materials around the room are and what they should do with them. For example, you can ask people to fill out name-tags, grab a cup of coffee, and make sure they have their handouts. If you would rather that your participants not pull out their readings or laptops right away, you can tell them when those materials will be needed. Ask your participants to introduce themselves. Limit the introductions to a few sentences by asking everyone to answer two or three specific questions, such as their names and what they hope to gain from the workshop. You don't want the icebreakers to go on forever, but it is important that your attendees feel comfortable talking in front of the group. You can also ask everybody to break the ice by answering a light-hearted question like "What is your favorite movie?" or "What is your favorite bad song?" This is when all of your careful preparations can be put into action. Have your outline in front of you, and try to stick to the outline if you can. Feel free to tell your participants directly what you are doing and why. Your lesson plan doesn't have to be a surprise, and your participants might appreciate being told why you've organized the workshop in the way that you did. For example, you might tell them:  "First we are going to go over our case studies to make sure we understand their nuances. After that, we will divide into small groups to determine an ideal solution to the problem." "We're going to spend some time learning key terms that will be useful to you as you learn this new computer program. After I explain these terms, we'll take a quiz to make sure we are on the same page. After that, we will open things up for discussion." "Please introduce yourself to the person sitting next to you. In a few minutes, you will role-play a counselor-student interaction with your partner." It is good to have a plan for your workshop, but be prepared to alter your workshop's content based on the reactions and experiences of the participants. Build some flex time into your lesson plan so that you can address their questions, concerns, and interests. You can even provide options for activities that your workshop group can vote on. This will allow you to focus on what really matters and skip over redundant or unnecessary content. Always follow up the delivery of information with the reinforcement of that information through some kind of group activity. Interactive group work is a particularly effective method to teach problem-solving techniques.  A workshop is not the same thing as a lecture, and you want to honor the thoughts and opinions of your workshop participants. Let them teach each other at the same time that you are teaching them. For example, you can:  Deliver information in short spurts and then allow participants to ask questions. Divide participants into groups to complete a task and ask them to report back to the entire group. Show a video clip and then ask pairs of participants to discuss their reactions. Provide advice about how to handle a difficult situation and then ask small groups of participants to role-play the scenario. Have an expert demonstrate a technique and then ask your students to take a collaborative quiz about the technique. You do not want to micromanage every stage of the workshop. Your participants might get bored or annoyed.Keep in mind that a workshop is different from a lecture or a typical meeting: it is a format that thrives on interaction, activity, and group work. Scheduling breaks helps people assimilate the information and reflect. Let participants know how often they will get breaks and the lengths of the breaks. This allows workshop attendees to plan accordingly for restroom usage, phone calls and other personal needs. Do not skip breaks, even if you are running short on time. Attention spans begin to wane after 20 minutes of the same activity. View this fact as an opportunity for creativity instead of as a problem. Change up your activities, ask your participants to rearrange their chairs, or schedule a break at least once every 20-30 minutes to keep everyone engaged and motivated. Even if you are treating a serious topic, humor can be a great way to emphasize information and keep everyone attentive. Think about ways that you can introduce humor in a responsible, ethical way into your presentations, discussions, and activities. This will also encourage your participants to remain relaxed, alert, and comfortable. Make sure that all of your workshop participants are treated equally and respectfully. This means that any leadership roles (such as group discussion leader) should be distributed evenly across the workshop. Encourage quiet, shy participants to speak. You want everyone to feel heard and respected. Similarly, you do not want a single participant's voice (or your own voice for that matter) to dominate the discussion. Most workshops will run smoothly. After all, the participants presumably want to be there and want to learn. However, there might be scenarios where somebody is unwilling to participate or might be insulting to a colleague. Be professional no matter what, and encourage respectful behavior by modeling respectful behavior. Be clear in what you expect from your participants. If you have a participant who is acting up or trying to bully a colleague, consider speaking privately with that person. Emphasize the importance of what you are teaching, and tell them that you expect adult, professional behavior from them. Explain everything that your participants have learned over the course of the session. This will help emphasize how far they have come and what new skills they have acquired. Refer explicitly to the objectives you laid out at the beginning of the workshop, and explain how you think the participants have met those objectives. Congratulate your workshop for their hard work and for their new knowledge.

What is a summary?
Introduce yourself and the workshop. Begin icebreakers. Execute your lesson plan. Be flexible. Use interactive exercises to reinforce information. Don't talk too much. Stick to your scheduled breaks. Switch up activities every 20-30 minutes. Lighten the mood. Maintain a respectful, democratic atmosphere. Be prepared for the unexpected. Conclude the workshop with a summary of what they have learned.