Quick-starting participants with virtual CCS Cards
Teach your participants to use their virtual CCS Cards AND introduce themselves to their colleagues in under 5 minutes.
There are lots of great practical, pedagogical and economical reasons to start using virtual CCS Cards in your facilitation, coaching and communication work.
The CCS Cards VFE allows you to give your participants up to 48 hours of free access to a pack of CCS Cards on their mobile that they can use during and after your session, both in-person and over video conferencing.
This quick-start activity takes advantage of that free access and will ensure that your participants feel comfortable shuffling through their packs and selecting and sharing their card choices.
It only takes a few minutes and rounds off with an enjoyable introductory moment to set the scene for your session.
Play
This script below assumes your participants have downloaded and installed the CCS VFE Cards App on their phone or tablet and joined your VFE session with the Session ID. [ ? ]
1/ Moving through and selecting cards: ARROWS
Hold up your tablet or phone running the CCS VFE Cards App and showing the tool bar at the bottom.
"Let's quickly learn how to use your lovely virtual CCS Cards, and get to know each other a little better at the same time!
Pointing to the left/right arrows:
"There are two ways to move through your cards.
Here's the first one: click on the either the left or right arrows.
Do this with me: click, click, click, click, click, STOP!
Now, click on the plus icon.
You have just selected your first card (albeit a random one!)
2/ Moving through and selecting cards: SWIPE
Now, start swiping across the screen:
"The second way to move through your cards is to swipe.
When you swipe, the cards go full screen.
Do this with me: swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, STOP!
Now, this time, you can add this card to your Selection with a simple double-tap.
OK, now you try! Select one more card for yourself either by swiping or using the arrows and then double-tapping or using the plus icon.
You should now have 3 cards in your Selected Pack.
If you don't see the bottom Toolbar, just touch the screen once to bring it back. In the bottom righthand corner you will see the Selected Icon showing #3.
Let’s click on that icon to jump to the Selected Pack.
3/ See your selected cards: SELECTED PACK
Pointing to the toolbar icons:
"On the Selected Pack screen, you can click or swipe through your 3 selected cards. This is a good screen for refining and sharing your choices with people beside you (or on screen).
Let’s refine your pack down to 2 cards by deleting one of your Selected Cards. Touch the screen once to bring up the Toolbar (if it’s not already showing). Click on the minus icon. That’s it – your card has been sent back to the Main Pack and you are back to 2 selected cards.
4/ See your cards laid out: LAYOUT SCREEN
Pointing and clicking on the Goto Layout icon in the bottom right:
"Now, let’s see your remaining 2 selected cards laid out together. Click on the Goto Layout icon in the bottom righthand corner.
You are now on the Layout and Share screen. This screen is also good for refining your choices and is the screen you use to Share your choices for all to see using the Share to VFE button (which we will do in our next activity).*
To delete a card from the layout
As you touch and drag one of the cards:
Let’s see how to delete cards from this screen – just touch and drag one of your cards over the minus icon in the bottom right of the layout area and release. That’s it – your card has been sent back to the Main Pack.
*Note to facilitator: Why didn't we have them 'SHARE TO VFE'?
If you are running a fully virtual session, you can have participants click Share to VFE to show their final card on the VFE Participants Board and then beautifully bring up each choice in turn to have them introduce themselves (Step 5).
However, we have also found that instead of sharing the VFE screen at this stage and staying in your video conference app's "gallery view" and having participants hold up their device to the camera actually works nicely for this initial activity. This is because participants are almost always animated as they talk about the image on their mobile, and more importantly, everyone else will be focused on the person sharing, which helps to promote initial connection. It also flows easily if you want to send them into breakout rooms for their introductions (which you may choose to do for larger groups). Finally, delaying the thrill of seeing everyone's choices can also add impact to your following main CCS Card topic which will usually have 3-5 cards.
5/ Introduce yourself!
Pointing to the remaining card:
You now have one card remaining on your Layout Screen. Let's use this random card to introduce yourself!
Now, always remember, any card can mean anything to anyone at any time – there are no set meanings for the cards. So feel free to pick whichever cards you like.
[FOR IN-ROOM] So, with that in mind, turn to the person beside you, and share something about yourself using this card as a springboard*.
[FOR ON-ZOOM] So, with that in mind, I want each of us to share something about ourselves to the group using this card as a springboard*.
*It’s good practice for you to go first to demonstrate a short response, and for you to be put on the spot just like your participants.
6/ Delete your last card: DONE!
As you touch and drag the last card on the screen:
OK, that’s it! We know a little bit more about each other, and we are ready to move on to a deeper question.
Let’s delete this card and get ready to start over – just touch-and-drag the card over the minus icon and you will be zapped back to the top of the pack!
Now move on to your main CCS Cards topic.
