Understanding and challenging HIV stigma. Toolkit for action. Moving to action module. Thinking about change. Moving to action. Developing skills for advocacy. Revised ed.

When action planning is introduced as the final session in a workshop it always feels like an empty ritual - something we are forced to do but without any commitment. It always comes too late in the workshop. By this time we have packed our bags (in our heads) and are ready to go. Then the trainer says Okay lets make a list of the actions you are going to do when you get home. We make the list just to keep him happy but we have no intention of carrying out what we have listed. These ideas die the minute we leave the workshop! We agree. We dont feel that action planning should be left as a last-minute activity tacked on at the end of a workshop. It should come earlier and be an important part of the whole process. In fact we have built action into many of the exercises so that people have already done the thinking about how to move against stigma and have started to practise the new knowledge and skills by carrying out mini-actions. Action is an important part of the learning process. As Paulo Freire has emphasised learning that does not lead to action is itself an empty ritual. (excerpt)