Step 1 Every trainees writes down for him/herself 10 rules that s/he thinks are important for this group;
Find a quiet spot.
Step 2 Return to the group and give your rules to the person sitting next to you.
Step 3 Read the rules slowly;
Remove one of the ten rules that you don’t think is very import- ant for this group.
Step 4 Return the rules to the person who made them. Step 5 One person in the group collects all remaining rules;
These remaining rules are then written on a flip-over; If any rules are rather similar, these are marked.
Step 6 Select those rules that have the most marks behind them, and make a top ten of rules;
The other rules will remain part of the next steps.
Step 7 Which of the remaining rules can be combined and put together as one?
Before any rules are combined, ask questions about what a rule means, and explain this;
Every act of combining rules into one has to be reasoned out, giving arguments.
Step 8 Giving his/her arguments, every trainee now proposes which of the remaining rules qualifies for a place in the top 10 rules for this group.
Step 9 Independently of the other trainees, everyone decides on his/ her order for the 10 rules for this group from the remaining rules;
The rankings are written down.
Step 10 A group of 3 trainees is chosen who count and then announce the outcome of the ranking;
After the presentation of this ranking, the group proceeds to make a decision on the basis of the result.
Source: Mulder, Voors and Hagen. (1989)
Execution
In step 1, I noticed at once that I had not left sufficient time to explain mat- ters. After my explanation about the first step, some trainees showed no sign of getting started; they apparently thought this an unusual question. In the
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groups where they did not make a first move, I made the idea behind the ac- tivity more concrete by taking a few trainees by the hand and placing them, with their chairs, in different places in the room.
Various trainees tried to wriggle out of working on their own by walking over to other trainees. I agreed that this was a demanding exercise and encour- aged the trainees to nevertheless carry out the first step on their own. When, finally, everyone had made a start, writing down ten rules without consulting the others similarly proved a strange and strenuous task. The minimum of ten rules forced them to look beyond the most obvious answers.
The trainees somewhat stalled at the third step, showing surprise here and there. The question arose in one or two groups whether they really had to cross out one of the ten rules. In these situations I encouraged the trainees to simply follow the procedure. I promised that I would later explain the why and wherefore.
In step 4, the trainees showed great interest in the collection they had put together. The coordinator and the interpreter translated and wrote down the rules so that I would be able to follow the inventorying and the result was visible to all. A pattern emerged after five presentations. Even so, I gave every trainee in every group an opportunity to present his/her nine remaining rules. This was an educational opportunity as well as an in-depth investment. I had to accept, though, that the scheduled programme time was overrun. During the fifth step one group was so alert as to spot that a formulation had been mentioned before, whereupon they checked if the earlier formulation had indeed been marked with a little line. In another group the reactions were very inquisitive, delighted and committed. Every group produced an average of 43 different rules.
Sometimes the trainees’ behaviour revealed a mechanism that was ‘locally normal’. For instance, a higher-educated male trainee crossed out a rule that a fellow trainee had just written down without anybody correcting him. When questioned, the trainee concerned answered that he had not deleted a rule but a wish. Upon my question how the owner was to understand, without this explanation, why his rule was not good, he put back the deleted rule. In another group the trainee whose task it was to write all the rules on a flip-over slightly altered the wording every time. When I had intervened a few times, the other trainees started to rectify the alterations he made in the formulations. Some trainees argued that collecting the rules could be
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