ANIMA offers a wide range of tools to spark more effective teaching and learning.
Listed below, you’ll find a sample of potential topics for speaking engagements or workshops (hover over the title to see a fuller description). Immersive retreats almost always integrate several content areas together.
The icons after each title suggest which of the four ANIMA principles that topic would draw from. Hover over any title to see a more complete description of content.
Show me sample Growth Mindset topics.
Show me sample Contemplative Practice topics.
Show me sample Positive Reinforcement topics.
Take me back to the Applied Improvisation page.
Do you find yourself shrinking from valuable opportunities for connection or driving others away with unintentional intimidation?
Based on the work of legendary British acting coach Patsy Rodenburg, engage in safe and playful movement, breathing, and speaking exercises that show you how to inhabit “Second Circle,” a physical and attitudinal way of being that generates:
- resilient confidence
- creative power
- authentic connection
Guaranteed to shift how you move in the world!
Improv training games do more than make you laugh: they can create tension or release it, generate humor or insight, and provide challenge or comfort. With a skilled facilitator, they also build:
- focus
- self-awareness
- self-confidence
- empathy
- listening skills
- effective collaboration
- problem-solving skills
Experience these exercises for yourself so you can energize your own workplace or classroom.
We improvise every moment of our work and personal lives—no one’s got a set script—yet we rarely pay attention to how we improvise.
Go behind the curtain to take on the curious principles and practices—like “yes, and,” “Be average,” “make your partner look good,” and “let yourself be changed”—that theatre professionals use to cultivate the skills needed for top-quality, in-the-moment performance:
- spontaneous speech
- flexible status transactions
- careful attention
- deep listening
- multi-level memory
- powerful presence
- interpersonal care
- collaborative discovery
- emotional range
- effective storytelling
Life changes and, these days, it changes faster than ever. Many respond to that uncertainty by seeking further control, but that effort almost always leaves us more rigid and less responsive. Build your ambiguity tolerance muscles and replace the impulse to control with a more nimble intention to:
- commit
- contribute
- connect, and
- co-create
From the cover of Time magazine and the U.S. military to the halls of academe and the locker rooms of professional sports teams, mindfulness has become a media darling du jour.
Learn why and how mindfulness offers more than a passing fad, delivering measurable changes for leaders, teachers, and learners:
- focused attention
- effective recall
- executive function
- empathic connection
- stress reduction
- sense of calm
- sturdy resilience
- well-being
Leaders, teachers, and coaches are discovering the paradoxical truths that slowing down can improve efficiency and non-striving can lead to greater accomplishment. They’re also realizing how the many forms of contemplative practice offer access to deeper insights and breakthrough innovations.
Learn the relevance and rigor behind this growing movement—and bring home experiential examples for your workplace or classroom.
Shift how you think about teaching and learning with a simple ‘dolphin training’ exercise to illustrate the central principle of positive reinforcement—reward movement toward the behavior you want and ignore the rest.
Teachers will leave with a keener understanding for the crucial importance of clear instruction, keen attention, and artful feedback. Learners begin to understand the importance of experimentation and engagement. Both groups learn to stay connected with each other.
