My P.E.T. Instructor Training Workshop Experience

Hello everyone! My name is Stephanie, and I am the new contact at Gordon Training International for P.E.T., Be Your Best, and T.E.T. (Teacher Effectiveness Training). I joined the GTI family in September, and the last two months have been an amazing, ongoing learning experience.

Towards the end of October, I had the opportunity to attend a five-day intensive P.E.T. Instructor Training Workshop. I left expecting to gain a more comprehensive understanding of what it might be like to teach P.E.T. and attend one of these workshops; I returned feeling not only that I had learned a tremendous amount, but that I had just experienced something life-changing.

(Our fantastic, fun workshop group! clockwise from bottom right: Sonal, Margaret, Rosie, Guy, Judi, our trainer Steve, and me)

The workshop was far more interactive than I thought any workshop for adults could be! Somewhere between all of the one-on-one attention our master trainer, Steve, offered each of us, the educational (and often hilarious) role-playing exercises, the feedback from my classmates, their student teaching sessions and my own, the days flew by, and I identified my strengths and my weaknesses. I found myself active listening successfully, and able to give myself feedback on how my I-Messages could have been better. I caught myself using roadblocks and then later, stopping myself before I used them; I knew when and how to shift gears.

role play!

As the week progressed, I saw the magic of P.E.T. come to life. I got to test my skills in a safe environment, and use them in real-life situations with my classmates and instructor. My classmates and I learned a lot from interacting with each other and had almost as many questions for each other as we did for the instructor.

at left: Judi's student teaching session, engaging the class in an exercise

Between the the fresh perspective our trainer offered on P.E.T. and being surrounded by 5 fellow enthusiastic P.E.T. instructor candidates, I left Tampa feeling inspired, self-aware, overjoyed, enthusiastic, happily exhausted, and confident in my understanding of all of the P.E.T. skills and in my ability to teach P.E.T. too.

It has been a little over three weeks since the workshop, and I'm still finding my feelings hard to put into words. This workshop was so much more than a workshop for me. I will forever be grateful for this experience. I use my P.E.T. skills every day and I can't imagine life without them now.

And while I intended to attend the workshop solely so that I would better be able to relate to those interested in attending a P.E.T. Instructor Training Workshop and answer their questions, I came away with a desire to share P.E.T. with others and a confidence in my ability to do so. (Part of this confidence comes from the P.E.T. wisdom that we are all human, and no one is perfect!) I would very much like to begin teaching P.E.T., and hope to do so in the spring.

Overall, my experience of a P.E.T. Instructor Training Workshop was extremely positive, emotionally engaging, and one-hundred percent motivating. I would love, love, love to go back!

Until then, I'll be here in sunny San Diego, practicing my P.E.T. skills and encouraging each of you who feels P.E.T. should be shared with the world to attend one of these amazing workshops, or to blog about your own P.E.T. experiences!

Cheers,
Stephanie :)