Robin Clayfield

Robin Clayfield is an international teacher, facilitator and author who is passionate about healthy groups, organisations and communities, their structures and governance and most importantly, their facilitation and group dynamics. She presents and consults all around the world to support global health, well-being and whole systems change through using Permaculture, Social Permaculture and ‘Dynamic Groups’ methodology. Robin is a Permaculture Pioneer and Elder who has lived at Crystal Waters Permaculture Eco-Village in SE Queensland, Australia since 1988. Her books and resources include ‘You Can Have Your Permaculture and Eat It Too’, ‘The New Permaculture Principles Card Game’, ‘The Creative Community Governance and Decision Making Resource Kit’ and the ‘Creative Process Wild Cards’. She is also the co-auther (with Skye in 1995) of ‘The Manual for Teaching Permaculture Creatively’ plus several resources and card games for teachers and facilitators.

Manual for Teaching Permaculture Creatively has a Brand New Cover

Teaching Permaculture Creatively

Thanks to the awesome graphic design skills and willingness of Robin’s partner Rob Clark ‘The Manual for Teaching Permaculture Creatively’ now has a brand new colour cover. Very fitting seeing as the iconic 320 page text, written by Skye and Robin in the early 90s and published by their business Earthcare Education in 1995, is turning 21 this year. Yeah! Many hundreds of people have purchased the Manual and it’s enjoyed in over 65 countries. In recent times it’s become available as a PDF through a DropBox Folder system. It was originally designed as a solid ring binder so it could be a huge ‘Tool Box’ to be added to over and over by its new owners as they witnessed, created or adapted processes that they wanted to remember and find easily. This hard copy is preferable to most people though click this link if you’d like to purchase the PDF …

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Jam Packed Victorian Tour

Robin recently completed a massive five week teaching and facilitation journey in Victoria, timed around an invitation to present at ‘Rainbow Serpent Festival’ and also enabling her to present at ‘Sustainable Living Festival’ and display her relevant books and resources there while helping out in the Edible Garden Area. ‘Rainbow Serpent Festival’ was a fantastic and wildly different event which mostly catered to young people out to dance and party hard. The more recently introduced ‘Lifestyle Village’ area opens the festival to a wider more conscious audience which is where Robin was invited in to be part of. It’s replete with a visionary art gallery, two ephemeral temple spaces, a small and a quite large presentation and workshop venue as well as a Permaculture garden area, Indigenous village, free healing and massage zone and children’s area. Robin presented two workshops on Permaculture design and Social Permaculture and was the only …

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‘Dynamic Teaching and Facilitation’ Book

Things are moving slowly with Robin’s writing of the five book series, though the two card games that are part of the project have been successfully launched – the ‘Permaculture Principles Card Game in September last year and the Creative Process Wild Cards in November. All the wild cards fed straight into the chapter that’s being worked on at the moment in Book 1, the ‘Tool Box’ chapter. As well as the 60 Creative Processes in the card set, the chapter will highlight many other processes, some that act as ‘Glue Processes’, serving the function of supporting the group to work well together, meet and greet and make the most of the material and the time spent together. Ice-Breakers, Name Games, Grouping Processes, Revision Processes and Check-In’s are a few examples.  Also included will be many conventional processes that, even though not creative or participatory, still are valid as ways to …

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The Joining and Being Woman… Facilitation and Ceremony

Every year Robin facilitates at several gatherings, festivals and conferences around Australia and sometimes overseas. Two gatherings that are closest to her heart and that’s she’s also involved in the behind the scenes support and the ceremony creation and energy holding are ‘The Joining’ held around the spring equinox and ‘Being Woman…’ held close to International Women’s day.  This year’s Being Woman… gathering had the powerful theme of ‘Freedom to Fly’ and supported approximately 70 women relax, deepen, share, create, empower, dance, release, heal, cry, laugh, hug and generally have a wonderful 2 ½ days away on retreat in the Mary Valley. Click here for a link to the FaceBook page and Click here to go to the Website The Joining is fast approaching this year and promises to be an expansive, deep and nourishing time. The theme is ‘Weaving the Invisible Threads of Community’. Men and Women come together …

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The Sacred Union Labyrinth at Woodford Folk Festival, Qld

Woodford Folk festival attracts 120,000 visitors over a six day period from 27th December to 1st January each year. For three years running Robin has coordinated and enjoyed immensely participating in creating ‘The Sacred Union Labyrinth’ as an art instillation and community ceremony space. It takes weeks of gathering materials, a full week to construct and one and a half days to return to nature at the end. Much maintenance is required to keep the space fresh and beautiful throughout the festival for literally thousands of people to walk. Four sacred ceremonies are held, where participants walk the Labyrinth to live music. The ceremonies are facilitated by Robin, Mark Healy, Christine Clegg, Stephane Cazard and Rob Clark. Robin is deeply honoured to share her design with the world in this expansive and supported way and acknowledges Mark for his spark of inspiration, Rob for his co-dreaming of the project and …

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Successful Trip to England, Wales and Spain

Robin spent a full 5 weeks in August and September 2015 on an amazingly full and fruitful adventure to UK and Spain, presenting courses in three countries, attending the International Permaculture Conference and Convergence, offering workshops there and also on the core facilitation team for an exciting global Permaculture initiative called Permaculture’s Next Big Step. She came home exhausted yet deeply satisfied at the response to her work and managed to cover the costs of her trip and sell lots of books, manuals and training resources that went home to dozens of different countries. One outcome is invitations to offer her ‘Dynamic Groups, Dynamic Learning’ Creative Facilitation and Teacher Training course in something like 7 European countries and the UK again in the middle months of 2017. Her trip began in the Mediterranean, on the Spanish island of Mallorca where she was hosted by PermaMed to run a one day …

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