Learning objective/ rationale:
- To help participants improve their decision-making skills.
- To strengthen collaboration, working as a member of a team.
- To encourage participants use relevant strategies to face problems when the latter emerge in a typical day at work.
Description of the method/nr. of persons of the group for which the method is suitable: This activity can be conducted by both participants with v.i. and sighted participants.
Step 1 The participants will be divided into groups of three or four. Then the facilitator/ leader of this activity will explain to the participants the process of this task. Then, he/she will give them a “problem-solving task”, a scenario of a situation, met in a typical day at work to be faced by each group. The scenarios are provided in Annex A.
Step 2 Each group will have to work on a different situation and find solutions, make decisions and use strategies to overcome any barriers so that the difficulty/ problem will be faced.
Step 3 The groups will have thirty minutes to work on their task: to read the scenario, use strategies and find possible solutions to face the emerged difficulties and write them down as a list or simple notes.
Step 4 After the groups have completed their task, all groups will have five to ten minutes to act a short role-play, presenting their task: the scenario and the solutions/results they have worked and decided on to overcome the problem/ emerged difficulty.
Step 5 A final discussion will be held about the used strategies, the way they worked out the problem and collaborated and other important elements to be shared among the groups so that the useful information will be spread around.
Materials needed: Pieces of paper, pens or markers, and braillers.
Time: 90 minutes
Questions for discussion/debriefing:
- Did I feel comfortable, sharing my ideas while working in a group?
- Did I learn any new ways to handle a situation?
- Did I need more instructions and clarifications on what to do during the task?
Handouts
Scenario A
The company you work for has organized a public event to be held in the city. As a part of the timetable, you have invited an external speaker to host a 90-minute presentation on the stage. The event has already started two hours ago and there is still one hour left until the speaker starts his activity. Suddenly, your phone rings and the speaker informs you that due to a private issue he is not able to come.
Scenario B
The company you work for has organized a training for all the employees. As the seminar begins, it gets clear that most of the presentation is based on visual material such as pictures and graphics, and the speaker does not give any additional information, which makes it difficult for the v.i. / blind colleague to follow the content. Scenario C The organization you work for has taken over parts of a collaborative project. At the end of the working day, some tasks are taken home to be completed till the next day. Everyone, including a v.i./blind colleague takes the responsibility for his/her own contribution. Coming home from work, the v.i./blind colleague wants to get the task done, but soon enough he/she realizes that the website that has to be used is not accessible at all.
Scenario C
At work, the employees (including a v.i. colleague) are asked to fill in an evaluation questionnaire after having attended an external seminar. The questionnaire was sent for each employee as a normal print.
Scenario D
In a computing company with many employees, there has been a new blind/partially sighted worker for six months. One of the sighted colleagues behaves to the v.i. worker in an unusual way. For example, he avoids using words like “look”, “see” and “watch” in direct communication. Whenever the v.i. worker has to move around/ leave the room for a task, the sighted colleague has already stood up to take it over and generally, he does not seem to be fully aware of his v.i. colleague’s abilities.
Source: VIVA Erasmus+ project