SOAR Facilitator Training: Writing for Healing Curriculum

This opening module grounds facilitators in SOAR’s purpose, principles, and circle methodology. You’ll trace the curriculum’s roots, define the Healing Circle model, and practice the protocols that keep participants safe: informed consent, confidentiality, opt-in/opt-out, culturally responsive facilitation, boundaries, and self/collective care. We’ll also cover prompt types, pacing, and how writing functions as a tool for healing without causing harm.

This module turns principles into practice. You will design a safe, purposeful session from first contact to closing circle: clarifying purpose and outcomes, defining audience and setting, selecting duration and circle size, building a trauma-informed agenda that moves from low-risk warm-ups into deeper writing, scripting consent and confidentiality language, assigning clear roles, planning accessibility and accommodations, and mdapping materials, space, evaluation, and follow-up so the workshop runs smoothly and ethically.

This module equips facilitators to build and maintain psychological safety before, during, and after sessions. You’ll establish clear community agreements (consent, confidentiality, opt-in/opt-out), practice trauma-informed and culturally responsive facilitation, recognize power dynamics and microaggressions, and use grounding, de-escalation, and repair techniques. We’ll cover mandated-reporting boundaries, crisis pathways, respectful witnessing and read-backs, privacy/data handling, accessibility in physical and virtual rooms, and self/collective care to prevent vicarious trauma.

This module shows facilitators how to turn weekly “Choose YOU! Wednesday Wisdom” pieces into complete, trauma-informed micro-lessons. You’ll map each selection to SOAR’s Healing Circle flow—opening/guided grounding, short read, meaning-making discussion, reflective writing, respectful witnessing, and closing—while adapting tone and depth for age, context, and cultural responsiveness. You’ll build repeatable lesson templates, align prompts with outcomes, and set clear boundaries, consent language, and follow-up supports so the work is affirming, not re-traumatizing.

This module builds core craft muscles with low-stakes, sensory-first exercises so even “non-poets” can write vividly and safely. You’ll use gentle constraints, word banks, and framing stems to help participants notice, name, and shape experience without forced disclosure—moving from concrete detail to image, from image to meaning. We’ll practice five-senses inventories, object writing, anaphora (“I remember…,” “Because…,” “I am…”), verb/noun sharpening, simile/metaphor ladders, line breaks and white space, and simple sound play—plus trauma-informed distancing options (third-person, persona/mask, place-based poems) and accessibility adaptations for varied literacy and language levels.

This module turns circle safety into hands-on facilitation of SOAR’s core writing arc—My Come From Place (personal narrative), My Worth Is (affirmation), Forgiveness Letter & Love Letter to Self, and Being Fierce & Dreamwork. You’ll learn to frame each activity with consent, model a brief exemplar, scaffold with sentence stems, pace the write/share/debrief cycle, and close with grounding. We’ll cover risk-level sequencing, adaptations for age and literacy, handling disclosures without prying, and light evaluation that honors voice rather than grading the person.