Transforming Facilitation: From Talks to Transformative Collaboration
What if every session we facilitators lead became a space where curiosity sparked, ideas flowed, and participants left feeling inspired and empowered? Mentoring facilitators in growth mindset skills isn’t just about sharing knowledge—it’s about crafting experiences that connect, engage, and transform. With Mita’s Growth Mindset approach, we move beyond passive learning to create collaborative, active sessions that blend participants’ insights, brain-friendly strategies, and real-world application. Together, let’s turn every talk into an opportunity for growth, action, and meaningful change.
This facilitator’s guide to transform talks into collaborative, active learning with Mita
1. Start With a Two-Footed Question (What’s Involved?)
• Question: How can we spark curiosity and connect the session content to activate participants’ interests and abilities?
• Target : Craft a question where one “foot” draws from the session’s material, and the other “foot” ties to the interests or experiences of all participants.
• Expect: The session topic and its doable concepts to be collaborated in a way that resonates with challenges we face in our lives or community
• Move multiple intelligences and brain facts into action to stoke unique interests and abilities of participants.
• Reflect: Consider, “Where to from here?” to ensure this work moves forward on a growth mindset pathway toward improving our situation in a way that benefits all concerned.

2. Affirm and Encourage Participation (What’s Involved?)
• Target: Build confidence and create a safe space for sharing facts to create change together.
• How: Recognize and affirm one valuable, interesting, or wise point shared by a participant.
• Why: Encouragement fosters trust and motivates others to contribute actively and build doable resolutions that benefit all.
• Example: “That’s such a thoughtful perspective. Thanks, it’s a great example of applying this idea in real life because….”

3. Introduce a Brain-Friendly Fact (What’s Involved?)
• Target: Provide actionable, science-backed insights to enrich the discussion, as facilitator piggy backs onto respondents answer to questions posed in ways that stoke interest.
• How: Share a brief fact about brain function and connect it to the topic, and to respondent’s shared insights.
• Example of Participant experience shared : “I find myself blaming leaders for failures we meet and I get angry about that.”
• Facilitator content input: “Thanks (name) for sharing, you speak for many of us here! When we face stress, cortisol levels can rise, which might narrow our focus. Let’s explore how re-framing this situation can build a positive, growth-oriented outcome.”

Growth Mindset in Action (What’s Involved)
By blending participants’ insights with content and brain-friendly principles, every session becomes:
• Collaborative: Participants feel included and valued.
• Active: Engagement deepens as ideas are applied to real-world scenarios.
• Empowering: Brain-based tools equip participants to think, grow, and thrive.
Empower sessions with Mita approach, problem solve the glitches with growth mindset possibilities, and watch more participants not only learn but transform.
We already have all we need to turn this straightforward application of the Mita’s approach. The three steps suggested here moves us into more creative, collaborative, and even playful sessions that blend participants’ insights, brain-friendly strategies, and real-world experiences. Together, we can turn what was expected to be mostly facilitator talk into opportunities for personal and collective growth, and with related actions, we are soon inspired to improve our situation so tat all experiences that connect, engage, and transform.
