# Beyond the Smile Sheet — Facilitator Guide

> Folder: `smile-sheet-alternative` · Category: feedback forms · any group · 10 min · offline + online · print props · tool pack
> License: CC BY 4.0

A reaction form that stops at "were you satisfied?" prices your next session wrong. This pack swaps the smile-sheet items for questions that surface what landed, what felt usable, and what will be tried on Monday — the learning and intent signals most feedback forms never capture.

## Objectives

By the end of the activity, participants will have:

1. Handed you three signals you can act on — what actually landed, how confident the room feels using it Monday, and which obstacle will get in the way.
2. Answered honestly under an explicit anonymity promise, with a control item in the deck that flags when the other answers are flattery.
3. Heard you commit, before the room disperses, to one change you will make because of what they wrote — the reason the next form gets filled in truth too.

## When to use this activity

- Your sessions close with a reaction form, and what the buyer can read out of it is satisfaction — never learning or transfer.
- You run a repeated course or series and want the trend of "landed / blocked" across editions, not one polite satisfaction score.
- The room can spare five to ten minutes at the close; cards on tables offline, the items pasted into a live form online.

## What this replaces

The classic smile sheet measures comfort, not transfer. High satisfaction and low behavior change sit side by side all the time. These items keep the warmth of a reaction form but add the three signals a facilitator can actually act on: what was learned, how confident the room feels using it, and which obstacle will get in the way.

## Setup

**Space:** one table per small group with the question deck face-up, or one screen showing the five chosen items; the collection point sits in the exit path.

**Materials per table:** one set of the six poker question cards (`smile-sheet-alternative-prop-cards.pdf`) and a pen per person — answers go on the card backs or the blanks.

**Materials for the room:** the anonymity promise said out loud, and a box or tray at the door; for the online version, the five items pasted into a form — the folder's FormLM prompt on the activity page already generates it from these exact question types.

**Grouping:** any size — cards circulate per table and every person answers; under ten people, run one card each with a quick show of hands per item.

**Roles:** everyone answers; you pick the five items that fit this session, state the anonymity promise, collect at the door, and read before you draft the next version.

## How to run it

| Time | Phase | What you do |
|---|---|---|
| 0–2 | Frame | Hand out one poker card set per table, or paste the items into your live form. Say: honest, anonymous, used to fix the next session. |
| 2–7 | Answer | Participants circle or type. Keep it under five items so people finish it — a half-empty form cannot be scored. |
| 7–10 | Read | Skim for the three signals: landed, confidence, barrier. Do not average them into one satisfaction number. |

Pick the five items that match your session from the six cards. One card is deliberately a control question — keep it; it tells you when the other answers are flattery.

## The card

Use the faces from `smile-sheet-alternative-prop-cards.pdf`: a master card, six question cards — landed (free text), Monday confidence (1–5), barrier, hands-on, add-or-cut, and the venue control — a watch-out card, branded backs and blanks to author your own. Keep the control face in view; it is the card that tells you when the room is being polite.

## Failure modes

- **Every item is agreeable.** If all six cards get top marks and nobody wrote a word, you ran a applause meter. Swap in the barrier card and re-ask.
- **Reading it as a score.** These items are signals, not a grade. A low confidence line is a lesson about the session, not about the participants.
- **Collecting and forgetting.** A reaction form nobody reopens teaches the room that filling it out is pointless. Report back one change you made because of it.

## Variations

- **Online:** paste the five items into a live form (the folder's FormLM block generates it from the real question set); take the control item along.
- **Two-minute version:** keep landed, confidence and barrier only — circle, collect, done.
- **Series tracking:** run the same five items every edition of the course; the trend of the three signals is the health metric, never a single score.
- **Wall read:** hold each card up and take a show of hands per item — fine for warm rooms; know that you are trading some of the anonymity that makes the answers honest.

## Facilitation notes

- Say the anonymity promise out loud before you collect; a named "feedback" form quietly trains people to write compliments.
- Read the three columns separately — the averaged number is exactly the signal you came for.
- Open the next session with one concrete change made because of the form; it is the cheapest investment in the next form's honesty.

## Put it on the wall

Print `smile-sheet-alternative-activity-poster.pdf` (A3) to put the run of show, the six items and the "read the three signals separately" rule on one wall while you facilitate.

## Props in this folder

- `smile-sheet-alternative-prop-cards.pdf` — poker-spec print sheet (63.5 × 88.9 mm, bleed and cut guides): master card, six question cards including one control, a watch-out card, branded backs and blanks
- `smile-sheet-alternative-run-sheet.pdf` — the print edition: this run sheet + the debrief, bound as one A4 document with bookmarks (`-Letter.pdf` is US Letter)
- `smile-sheet-alternative-activity-poster.pdf` — the whole form on one A3 wall sheet
- `smile-sheet-alternative-guide.md` · `-debrief.md` · `-start-here.md` — the facilitator guide, the reading guide, the one-page start here
- `smile-sheet-alternative-license.md` — what you may do
- `SKILL.md` · `smile-sheet-alternative.zip` — the machine-readable manifest, and the whole folder in one download

## Agent version

Every file in this folder has a stable public URL — an AI agent can fetch the question deck, the reading guide and this run sheet with three curl commands (see `SKILL.md`). The paper version needs no screen: cards, pens, and a box by the door.