• Choose a place for the activity and set the time. The walk is the essential starting point: the following three methods can be conducted consecutively or alternately, depending on the group’s needs or your preference.
• It can also be useful to gather information on the history of places and how they changed over time and events. It is therefore worth asking yourself: do I know the history of this place? Do I have someone to ask? If yes, write down a few words to help you describe this context to the group before the walk begins.

Method 1: Exploring places through the senses In leading the group on this journey of rediscovering the world around them (and their own way of perceiving it), you can guide the participants’ attention through this list of questions: What do you see? Try to watch out for usual things and unusual spaces. Take pictures whenrever you feel something is important or you notice details to investigate; What do you smell/taste? Smells shape the spaces too and help us ask monitoring questions; What do you hear? From the sounds of houses to the sounds of the street, noises can tell a lot about the surroundings. In this case, it may be useful to draw a ‘sound map;’ What are you touching? Try to experience a place through your hands too, because touch also provides important information.

Method 2: S.W.O.T. Analysis Before the start of the walk, hand out a four-space answer sheet to the participants. As the title of each space, copy the following questions:

• What are the Strengths of this place as it is today?
• What are the Weak points of this place as it is today?
• What are the Opportunities to improve this site in the future? Which civic monitoring measures would bring maximum value from these opportunities?
• What are the future Threats to this place? How can these risks be minimised through wide and disseminate participation or monitoring action?

During the walk, participants must fill out the table divided into four sections. They can write down just a few words, which will allow them to remember the concept in the following group work.

Method 3: Photovoice The use of an image enables an active reflection among the participants and makes them aware of the resources and potential already possessed and to be developed. Therefore, you can conduct the activity in this way:

• Participants take photos wherever they find it useful during the monitoring walk.
• Print the photos and with the group write small captions for each of them.
• Arrange all the photos on the floor and try to organise them in similar places, or for similar problems, but without overlapping them.
• Start a common discussion with the aim of deepening the understanding of the context they capture, using questions such as: What do you see in this picture? What is going on? What does this have to do with our lives? Why does this problem/situation occur? How does this problem relate to other problems?

N.B. In this activity, participants are asked not to judge the quality of the photos, but to focus on the meaning.