Placing the Empathy Circle at the Center of the MOOC
I haven't put too much thought into it yet; however, your email prompted me to think about it some more! The comments below are just initial ideas to help our discussion and they are not listed in priority.
1. We know that "practicing" empathy is something that we offer that no one else offers; it is our niche.
That is why the empathy circle process needs to be the foundation of the course.
3 We just added "facilitator" to our list of roles. I assume that if someone makes money on the course it would primarily be the person who is "facilitating" the empathy circle. To help ensure quality control - there needs to be a certification process for the facilitator. Especially, if we ever want to give continuing education credits.
4. The course consists of X (TBD) number of sessions. Each session has a specific topic(s) that will be discussed and practiced:
Prework: Send participants a link to the COE website, the empathy circle page, and ask them to read about the empathy circle, become familiar with the empathy circle process, and watch videos clips of empathy circles. The purpose of the pre-work is so they come to the course with some familiarity with the empathy circle and have an idea of what to expect.
The facilitator will distribute course materials prior to each session for participants to review.
Session 1 Topic. Introduction
a. Why did you take this course? What do you want to get from it?;
b. What is empathy/empathic understanding?
Why is empathy/empathic understanding important?
Why is practicing important?
c. Review the prework.
Session 2 Topic. What happens when someone listens reflectively?
Session 3 Topic. I have to think more about the topics.
Session 4 Topic. I have to think more about the topics.
Session 5 Topic. I have to think more about the topics.
5. Each session of the course follows the Empathy Circle Process:
a. Check-in (how you are doing in the moment; any interesting experiences with reflective listening since the prior week)
b. Facilitator and participants discuss the Session Topic;
participants get questions answered.
For sessions 1, 2, 3 and maybe more, the participants should discuss (and not reflect back) during this part of the process.
One major benefit of having it be a discussion is that it allows participants to ask questions and can provide participants insight into their own behavior as well as other participants behavior related to listening, for example they might notice their own and others roadblocks.
c. Practice empathy
d. Discussion about how this session went
e. Close-out