DI Method, the Direct Instruction method is developed by Siegfried Englemann and others.
DI method recommends the following:
- Breaking the complex skills into atomic components
- Illustrate each component with examples.
- Asking the students/trainees to practice more on each component.
How to adopt DI in Mediation Training:
Example:
While making restatement.
The mediator listens to the narrative given by each of the parties and then proceeds to make the restatement.
The mediator gives the gist/summary of the narrative.
But such summarizing will have within it several other skills interwoven.
Some of the following skills are used while making restatement: Summarizing: Paraphrasing (simplicitor or verbatim), filtering, reflection, neutral reframing, acknowledgment, etc.
A perfect restatement will have all these and at times some other skills integrated into it.
The trainer introduces each of these skills to the trainees. Gives several examples for each of the skills. Asks the participants to give more and more examples. And makes them get a perfect hold on each of the skills.
Once the trainee gets hold of all the skills, the trainer asks the trainee to integrate the required skills in his/her restatement.
ADVANTAGES
- Complex topic becomes easier to understand.
- Learning does not become stressful.
- Theoretical knowledge gets integrated into practical knowledge.
- Each and every component of a given topic stays strongly rooted in the learner.
“You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.”
Martin Luther King Jr.
(All Copyrights reserved by the author S.Susheela)
Training of Trainers in Mediation 