Accelerating Laboratory Learning Through a Phase Progression Model for Trainer Intervention

Abstract

A T Group's capacity for learning need not emerge only at the group's "natural" pace, as trainers have so often assumed. Trainers can, and many do, use methodologies that accelerate a group's rate of learning. This paper describes one such methodology for accelerating a group's rate of learning: a phase progression model for trainer intervention. What follows is an example of how the author-trainer experimented in systematically using his understanding of T-Group phenomena to conceptualize and to point to a sequence of phases which might be optimum for a particular group in accomplishing its learning objectives. This example also illustrates one relatively simple technique for shifting a group's focus from one issue, or phase of exploration,' to the next. Taken together, the sequence of phases and the technique for shifting from one phase to the next comprise essential elements of the "phase progression model." A more exhaustive explanation of all the elements included in this example and a discussion of how the model allows individual trainers to utilize their own preferred theories of trainer participation follow the example.