Facilitating encounter within an academic course on communication

Abstract

This paper deals with the potentials and limitations of group encounters in academic teacher training. The major research question is whether person-centered encounter groups should get their space within teacher education and if so, which factors need to be taken into account to maximize students’ whole-person learning through encounter. The author’s–my–finding after more than a decade’s research is that encounter groups–even when lasting a few hours only–tend to leave valuable impressions and growth-motivation on the vast majority of students. Moreover, the atmosphere in class becomes more open and direct, more genuine and more constructive. It proved helpful to introduce students to this distinct experience as this is, for most of them, an unprecedented experience in their academic life. Moreover, a student-centered course that includes encounter group phases appears to benefit from a highly flexible structure, from regular personal online reactions shared with the whole course-community, and from including work in small groups too. For the latter, students tend to appreciate the Open Case setting which is intended to support ‘case providers’ in finding their path toward tackling specific challenges that they volunteer to share in a person-centered atmosphere.