Group Work, Breakout and Stations

Most activities are one block. Three block types hold several things inside them, and which one you reach for depends on how the room is organised. Group Work is one task everyone does together, in phases that run one after the other. Breakout is several rooms working at the same time, with different people in each. Stations/Segments is a set of stations people rotate through in order, or visit a chosen number of. On the timeline each is one row; what is inside shows when you open it.

Steps

1. Click the arrow on + Add activity at the bottom of a day, or hover between two blocks and click the blue + line that appears.
2. Pick Group Work, Breakout or Segments / Stations. It starts at 60m for Group Work (four phases), 30m for Breakout, and three stations of 20m for Stations.
3. Click Add title and name it. The line underneath asks for the block's purpose — What should this block produce?, for instance — not a list of what is inside.
4. Click the chevron at the right end of the row. Only one block is open at a time.
5. Group Work: four phases come ready, named in the agenda's language. Click a name, or What happens in this phase, to rewrite it. Hover a phase to reveal − and + on its minutes, or click the number and type. Hover the line between two phases and click Insert phase here; the new phase takes the minutes of the one above it. The arrows move a phase; the cross deletes it.
6. Breakout: Per room is the block's length — every room runs for the same minutes, at the same time. The − and + beside rooms add or remove a room, up to 15. + people sets a headcount that is spread across the rooms. Click a room to open it: give it a Room topic…, add steps with Add a step, and use Duplicate room or Delete room.
7. Stations: Per station/segment sets the minutes for every station; open it and choose Custom durations to give each row its own number. Join all means everyone visits every station in turn; Join 1 of 3 means people pick that many, and the stations run in parallel. Each row has a title, a Describe this station/segment line and a + Responsible field. Add row adds a station.
8. Set the block's own length in the time column: hover the duration and use − and +, or click it and type. This changes the block and nothing inside it. The summary line on the row then compares the two: +5m transition when the contents are shorter than the block — normal, people need time to move — 5m over in amber when they do not fit, and 40m unassigned when less than half the block is planned. Inside the open block, Distribute evenly spreads the block's minutes across its phases or stations so they add up exactly.

Tip: Under Join 1 of 3 the stations table shows no start times. The stations run at the same time, so there is no order to clock; switch back to Join all and the times return.

What to do next

Start times inside a block are derived, not typed: phases follow one another from the block's start, and a breakout's rooms start and end together. To move the block itself, or hold it to a fixed time, see Blocks, days and start times and Lock a block to a fixed time.