NHT has invited Tina Lathouras and Peter Westoby from Queensland to present three regional community development workshops especially for our Neighbourhood House network. They have presented this training to House managers in Queensland, and Tina presented on the Spiral Method at the World Community Development Conference in Ireland in 2018. Peter was also a keynote speaker at the World CD Conference.

So what is the Spiral Method?

The Spiral Model of Community Education is an approach developed by community development practitioners that helps groups do thinking that 'spirals' from personal experience to action.

It's a 'bottom up' process that enables people to tell their stories, to name issues, and with others do some thinking about why those issues are impacting on communities. Based on that collective thinking, groups form around strategies for action, they take action and then return to the bigger group to reflect on that action

These workshops are heavily subsidised by NHT through a Skills Tasmania grant and are for House staff, board members & volunteers . They provide a great opportunity for Houses to come together to spend a winter’s day immersed in community development discussions and training.