History Map

Step 1:

Prepare by rolling out a long piece of paper (5-10 meters) on the floor or on a wall. Draw a timeline representing the period of a project or team experience. Include dates and a few key events, but not more.

Facilitator notes

In some spaces, it will not be possible to use candles. In this case, have participants place post-its instead.

Step 2:

Ask participants to draw in elements of their experiences. They can include their highlights and lowlights of the journey, as well as insights, emotional highs and lows, challenges, successes, frustrations, stories and surprises, situations, learnings, and anything else that meant something. An alternative is to do this step using images from magazines. Spread out a large pile of old magazines, along with scissors and glue. Participants do the same as above, but using magazine cut-outs rather than drawings.

Put on music while participants to this. Give enough time that the paper becomes as full as possible (about 15-30 minutes, depending on the size of the group and length of the timeline)

Step 3:

After the map has been created, ask participants to walks around the map, reflecting in silence on the experiences they have shared. Ask them to begin thinking about the most important moments for them, individually. Give about 5-10 minutes for this step.

Step 4:

Finally, have participants sit or stand around the map in a circle. Then, one-by-one, participants place a candle (a tea light) the moment that has been the most important to them. After placing the candle, they briefly describe the moment and its significance. Continue until all participants have placed a candle and shared.

Tips for running this activity online

• Pick an online whiteboard tool that allows you to use a large, zoomable canvas.
• Draw the timeline in the online whiteboard and invite participants to add to it throughout the exercise.
• Instead of placing a candle, have your team place a symbolic image or company logo while sharing. A GIF or meme might also work. If you’re using an online whiteboard tool such as Mural, you can use voting features such as Mural’s voting session tool when voting during the final step.
• If you’re not using an online whiteboard, we’d recommend using a collaboration tool such as Google Docs to collect the information for each step under a separate heading. Invite everyone into the document to share their ideas but be very clear in regards to editing rights.
• When facilitating group discussion, we recommend participants use non-verbal means to indicate they’d like to speak. You can use tools like Zoom’s nonverbal feedback options, a reaction emoji, or just have people put their hands up.The facilitator can then invite that person to speak.