These activities are mostly taken from Sharon Bowman's excellent books: The Ten-Minute Trainer and Training From the Back of the Room. For each activity, print out instructions and put them up on a wall. These are ideas and options: don't try and do them all! :)

Warm-up exercises (a week before the workshop)

What you know, and what’s your plan

Send students an email, asking them two of these questions.

• What are three things you already know about programming? (Small things or big things! Who does it? What can you make? Why do people write software?)
• What do you want to learn?
• What do you plan to do with what you learn?

Just before the workshop begins

Share your answers

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down your answers to the warm-up questions.
• Swap your answers with someone else.
• Swap again with someone new.
• Put the sticky notes up on the wall.

What's in it for me?

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down what you want to learn today.
• Find someone new and share your answer with them.
• Put the sticky notes up on the wall.
• Come back to them at the end of the day.

What does a developer look like?

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down answers to: "What does a developer look like?"
• Take a card from the table and find out the answer.
• Compare your earlier answers to the person you found on the internet.

The cards are clues to finding developers (e.g. who wrote "Designing for Performance"). The answers are developers who are from groups of people that are underrepresented in tech.

What does an engineer look like?

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down answers to: "What does an engineer look like?"
• Look up #ILookLikeAnEngineer and find an awesome person there.
• Introduce them (and yourself!) to someone in the room.

What makes a good Web App?

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down at least three things that a good web app needs.

Find Your Match

• Take an index card from the table.
• Find someone with the same card as you.
• Together, find out what the technical term means.
• One of the back of one of the cards, write the explanation down, and stick the cards up on the wall for other to read.

The cards have tech terms on them, such as: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, front-end, Ruby, Rails, Model, View, Controller, MVC. Alternate version: cards have just acronyms: HTML, CSS, JS, MVC, DB, SQL.

Match It Up

• With a partner, grab a deck of index cards.
• Match up cards with their definitions.
• Check your answers.

The deck contains:

• Ruby
• Rails
• Git
• Heroku
• Sublime Text
• Terminal / Command Prompt
• Browser

These are in the opening presentation, and students have been using these things during the InstallFest. This activity helps them see how their learning is progressing.

During the workshop

Good, bad, change

• Grab a pen and a card.
• Write down one good thing.
• Give your card to someone and take a card with one good thing on.
• Write down one bad thing.
• Give your card to someone and take a card with one bad thing on.
• Write down one thing you would change.

This can be for the InstallFest or the workshop in general.

Pass That Card

• Grab a pen and a card.
• Write down a question you have.
• Give your card to someone and take a card with a question on.
• Write down an answer to the question on the card.
• Give your card to someone and take a card with an answer on.
• Write down agree or disagree.

What Three Things

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down three things you've learned this morning, one per sticky note.
• Discuss them with a partner.

Take A Stand

• Stand on a line from not so confident to very confident.
• Pair up with someone from the other end of the line and discuss any problems you've had, and get ideas for solutions.

Three things about Ruby or Rails

• Grab a pen and sticky notes.
• Write down one thing that you can do now.
• Write down one thing you're still unsure about.
• Write down one thing you'd like to learn.

Three most important things

• Write down the 3 most important things you learned so far.
• Discuss your list with 3 people.

Ending the workshop

Hey, buddy

• Grab a pen and a card.
• Write down a SMART goal on the front of a card.
• Write down your name and email address on the back of a card.
• Swap cards with a buddy, and agree to email each other during the next week.

A SMART goal is Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-bound.

Valuable

• Grab a pen and a card.
• On your own, write down the most valuable thing you've learned today.
• In groups of 3 or more, discuss your cards.