Applications Are Now Open ꩜
Applications Are Now Open ꩜
✨The School of Play ✨
Relational Ecology
Collaboration Methodologies
Improvisational Creative Group Facilitation Training
online, Sept 19 2026 - May 1 2027
Opening Ceremony Sept 19th; Closing Ceremony May 1st 2027
7 online modules
+ optional in-person and online experiential workshops
Info Session
July 24, 2026
9-10:30 am pacific time
Meet Katriona, pose any questions about the program, meet others considering joining the School of Play, & enjoy a simple experiential practice with those gathered to begin your contemplative engagement with the material.
What is the School of Play?
Experiential, reflective training in collaborative leadership and improvisational-embodied creative group facilitation, rooted in Relational Ecology.
Embodied Beauty Magic; Decolonizing Ecofeminist, EcoSomatic, Movement-Based Expressive Arts, and Wise Playfulness For Cultural Shapeshifting in Leadership in Groups and Life.
Where & When:
online, September 19th, 2026 through May 1st, 2027
Program Dates:
opening Sat Sept 19
module 1: Oct 30/31
module 2: Nov 27/28
module 3: Dec 18/19
module 4: Jan 15/16
module 5: Feb 19/20
module 6: Mar 19/20
module 7: April 16/17
closing Sat May 1
Half day opening ceremony Saturday Sept 19th, 2026, & Half day closing ceremony Saturday May 1st, 2027
+ 7 modules of 1.5 days each time
modules are held 1x a month, Oct-April
Friday mornings 9 am -12 pm pacific time,
& All day Saturday 9 am -4 pm pacific time
Note: while we do not meet on Friday afternoons as a group, there will be a simple, generative practice/reflective inquiry offered at each Friday morning session for folks to complete before the Saturday training day.
Teaching components of the modules will be recorded for folks to review after/between the modules, and as support for folks who may need to miss a day of the live program.
Acceptance to the program is by application, followed by an interview if participant and Katriona do not already know each other.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Folks who are leading groups or want to be leading groups; folks who want to grow their courage and creativity in improvisational facilitation; folks who want to deepen their ability to accompany nuance in a group. Folks seeking to work through the methods of polymodal creativity, relational ecology, and kindness. Folks interested in liberatory pedagogy in groups in these times of complexity.
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Pay your deposit after acceptance to the program.
Choose from a tiered pricing model, designed to accommodate folks with different range of access to funds.
Full remaining payment is due 1 month prior to the start of the program.
You may elect instead to follow one of 2 payment plan variations to complete the remainder of the tuition payment
payment plans incur a slight administrative fee for the labour involved in tracking additional payments.
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Tiered Pricing, in USD:
Supporter: $2500
Sustainer: $2200
Scholarship: $1800
Deposit $500 to secure your spot
These rates reflect payment in full 1 month prior to the beginning of the program on August 19th.
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After paying a $500 Deposit upon acceptance to the program, folks pay the remainder of the tuition by following 1 of these 3 options:
1) Pay the remainder of the tuition in full on August 19, 1 month prior to the start of the program.
2) Pay 50% of the post-deposit remainder of the tuition on August 19th, and the outstanding remainder on September 4th.
For this option 5% administrative fee is added to total tuition payment.
3) Pay 50% of the post-deposit remainder on August 19th, 15% on September 18, followed by installment payments for the outstanding remainder of the tuition - each paid 1 week before the beginning of each module of the program: meaning that 35% of the post deposit remainder is split over 7 modules.
For this option a 15% administrative fee is added to the total tuition, reflecting the added coordination required to track 9 separate payments over the program.
Full break down of the tuition payment plans will be provided, when folks register and select the Tier of payment that works with their financial access.
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Payments are Non-Refundable.
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Open the application; send in a response; attend an info session if you like, reach out if you have questions.
Upon receipt of the application, an interview may be suggested, if we do not yet know each other.
Once accepted to the program you will be sent a welcome package and an invoice for the tuition deposit.
Each participant will have an opportunity to meet 1-1 with Katriona to discuss the program and participation, longings, & needs.
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Training in deep listening, embodied attunement, creative sourcing, collaboration, relational ecology, mysticism and neuroscience, old wisdom lineages and ephemeral improvisations, innovative encouraging of kinship through biodiversity affirming and celebrating atmosphere and liberatory pedagogy
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I’m interested in learning with you. I’m curious, playful, and nurturing, inventive and collaborative, bringing poetry and neuroscience, and 30 years experience running groups through an improvisational ethos and a multimodal arts medicine bundle. I will challenge and encourage you and support you at your growing edge to deepen your confidence, creative enlivenment, and experiential leadership artistry.
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Yes, there will be reading and experiential menus for your contemplations to support your depth tending in your practice between modules.
Participants will have opportunities to connect with colleagues in small groups/student hubs to support the thread between modules.
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There will be a maximum of 20 participants to create intimacy and depth; a maximum of 4 traveling parties of 3 to 5 - student hubs within the program collective.
curriculum and approaches
Embodied Beauty Magic; Decolonizing Ecofeminist, EcoSomatic, Movement-Based Expressive Arts, and Wise Playfulness For Cultural Shapeshifting in Leadership in Groups and Life.
experiential conversations, teachings, & experiential inquiries
engaged practice, personal reflection, and contemplative conversations
time in the full group, small groups, and personal practice inquiries
Relational Ecology
Biodiversity is wisdom
Awe and Kinship with Longing as buoyancy, canoe, and paddle
practicing ecosensory listening with Soul and Earth as resonant collaboration
the state of things that are tangled (related to colonial heteropatriarchal white supremacy culture), where we are located within these lineages and complexities, and personal and collective practices and presence for cultural shapeshifting.
liberation praxis lineage and approaches
unpacking ‘imposter syndrome’ with a contextual lens
Embodied collaborative listening
Accompanying emergent currents and the hum of the murmuring deep
Collaboration training - methods and approaches
a leader in every chair, & process to move from the chair through the room, and out of the room into the world
working with elementals and directions, ritual, ceremony and the sacred center
holding one’s own, the ground of leadership, under standing, supple embodied presence
Holding complexity and consent
Fostering Radical Tenderness in a group field
Responding with the presence of harms, grief, & trauma; staying with the Trouble & the wise council of Titration; Nervous System Modulation for grounded trauma wise facilitation.
Dance Movement, Play, Art, Writing, Music, Sound, and Song
Ecosomatic creativity, Relational Ecology
Creativity, improvisation, and collaboration as deep sustenance for these times
inquiries with the qualities, engaged values, processes, methods, approaches to leadership that are needed for such times as these.
how to find mentors and collaborators, how to nurture such relations, being real in our relations
collaboration with one another, with a group, with what is emergent; collaborative methodologies, stances, guides, contemplations
cocreating microcultures of health and generativity
responding with conflict and relational tangles in groups and in collaborative partnerships
the inner work that supports generative, kind conflict praxis
the generative possibilities of light and shadow -
understanding and responding with the currents of harm that ripple through our collective
noticing, nurturing, and developing creativity possibilities as they begin to seed, root, and germinate
tending the small, subtle, nuanced, emergent, and the repeating themes and strong currents
Come check out videos at The Video Library:
Homespun Videos for Playful Nourishment
Like this clip from a Story About Awe as a Practice and a Pathway for Tending Mental & Physical Wellbeing and Creativity.
Additional Experiential Optional Menu
In addition to the online program, folks are invited to attend one or more of the following workshops as an experiential learning opportunity.
Each workshop provides a different view on improvisational creative group facilitation and collaborative methods.
choose your own adventure from the list of options.
participation at one is recommended, attending more than one is welcome, and none are required (this structure is to help the training be more financially accessible for more folks)
options:
in person with Katriona, on Salt Spring Island: Body As Earth Song summer retreat, August 18-23, 2026
in person Mysticism and Modulation, Nov 10, 11, 12, 2026, at Dance Victoria, collaborative facilitation with Katriona and Dev Bry
in person in Victoria, BC: Soul Motion workshop with Soul Motion Founder Vincent Martinez Grieco, Nov 13, 14, 15, 2026 Impermanence and Collective Effervescence.
online Poetry and Dance workshop, collaborative facilitation by Katriona and Dorothy Lemoult (dates TBA)
online with Katriona Rest or Supple Earth, each program is a 6 week ecosomatic/movement/art adventure, Rest runs in the fall/winter and Supple Earth rungs in the spring (dates TBA)
online with Katriona and Patricia Escorihuela - morning practice; starting the day with a focused creative somatic mindfulness inquiry, in a group, together through time, exploring the influence of this practice in our lives. Jan/Feb 2027
online program with Katriona and Jacqueline Compton, TBD