Follow the Facilitator
Presenting games as important and meaningful is challenging for the most experienced facilitators.
A facilitator’s job has three parts:
- lead the activities
- guide the reflection
- be enthusiastic.
Enthusiasm is contagious! Keep debriefing simple and straightforward. Often, the mood of the instructor will set the tone for the entire group. So above all be positive and have fun with the activity, with the session, and with the players.
Creating Guidelines & Goals
Have participants create ground rules or guidelines before you begin the games. Brainstorm potential rules and write them down, but avoid too many rules.
There are three essential guidelines:
- Safety first. Never compromise the safety of yourself or others.
- Challenge by choice. If someone wants to sit out, that’s cool.
- HAVE FUN!
Every group should have some specific goals that all players agree on.
Some goals have included: Break down the barriers that may exist between students such as race, sex, background, and social status; Build a sense of teamwork and purpose; Show that everyone has different strengths and abilities to offer the group and that no one is better than anyone else.
Framing & Sequencing
The purpose of the games is often set during the introduction, or framing, of the activity. The activity may be introduced as a story, creating a magical place where dangerous things can happen without teamwork. For a more mature group, games can be introduced as metaphors, alerting the participants to look for deeper meaning.
Another important consideration is the order in which you play games, or sequencing. If a group has never played together, it might be important to do icebreakers and to “soften” the personal space bubble. If they are more comfortable with each other, try bursting the bubble, and get deep in your activities.
Try to put complex activities after less challenging ones, to build a sense of accomplishment.
Reflect, Reflect, Reflect
One way to highlight the role of games in social change is in the reflection after the activity. An easy way to see the relevance of reflection is to picture games as a circle: you start with an explanation of the activity, framing its purpose and goals to the group. The activity progresses, with the facilitator taking a more hands-on or less guiding approach as needed. Finally, the group reflection helps participants see how they met the goal, and to envision the broader social change implications. Then the group has come full-circle.
Be as concrete or as “spacey” as you want; during the activities it’s important to “lose ourselves” in what we’re doing, and to have a lot of fun. But remember to bring it all back to reality with the reflection. Reflecting on the activities is vital to bring the group back to the reason why they’re playing games.
The following types of questions are useful in reflecting:
- Open-ended question prevent yes and no answers. What was the purpose of the game? What did you learn about yourself?
- Feeling questions require participants to reflect on how they feel about what they did. How did it feel when you started to pull it together?
- Judgment questions ask participants to make decisions about things. What was the best part? Was it a good idea?
- Guiding questions steer the participants toward the purpose of the activity and keep the discussion focused. What got you all going in the right direction?
- Closing questions help participants draw conclusions and end the discussion. What did you learn? What would you do differently?
Connecting With Purpose
At best these activities can serve as bridges between social change work, learning, and community building, reinforcing the need for communication, co-learning, and collective decision-making. At worst, they can be tools of oppression and alienation, serving to support vertical education practices and isolate people from each other.
Good luck and have fun with your students!