The Next Step Blog

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Create Meaningful Advisory Structures

Providing opportunities for making choices and speaking out are critical components of positive youth development programs. But it’s challenging to do this with a large group of kids who may want to go in 30 different directions. Here are ideas from a gallery activity at the 2008 Chrysalis After-School Facilitator Training for creating meaningful advisory structures with young people–

  • Rotate teams
  • Form committees & facilitate meetings with adults
  • Let everyone who wants to advise be involved
  • Facilitate activities that work toward group goals and objectives
  • Vary groups across grade levels
  • Provide consistency

Discussion Topics

Okay, I put it out there–What are some good discussion topics for middle school girls? Here is the first response I got on Facebook–
–music, clothes, dance, friendship and who’s cute-circa 1970’s
–music, clothes, dance, friendship and who’s cute -using cellphones, social networking, text, -circa 2009

Here are some more–

  • Media portrayal of girls/women
  • Cliques
  • Movies
  • Books
  • School
  • TV shows
  • Pets
  • Scars
  • Why you have your name
  • Grooming, cleanliness and makeup
  • How to pick out a good fitting bra and dressing for your body type

Fishbowl Discussion

A fishbowl discussion allows everyone in a large group to participate in a series of small group discussions. In a group larger than four or five it’s hard for everyone to have a chance to speak.

This method allows up to five people to discuss a topic for a set amount of time, with the rest of the group taking turns as the audience. It’s a non-threatening way to develop speaking and listening skills. It can help people get over the fear of speaking in front of a group because it’s more like a conversation than speaking before an audience.

Arrange four or five chairs in an inner circle. This is the fishbowl. Arrange the rest of the chairs in concentric circles around the fishbowl. Select enough participants or ask for volunteers to fill the fishbowl, while the rest of the group sit on the chairs outside the fishbowl.

Now introduce the topic for discussion and the participants in the fishbowl start discussing the topic. The audience outside the fishbowl listens.

You can choose between an open fishbowl and a closed fishbowl, two different methods to make sure everyone gets a chance to join in the conversation.

In an open fishbowl, leave one chair empty and explain that any member of the audience can, at any time, occupy the empty chair and join the fishbowl. When this happens, one member of the fishbowl must voluntarily leave the fishbowl so there is always one free chair.

The discussion continues with participants frequently entering and leaving the fishbowl. This method, if your audience members are interested and assertive, will allow most audience members to spend time in the fishbowl and participate in the discussion.

When time runs out, close the fishbowl and summarize the discussion.

In a closed fishbowl, all chairs are filled. The initial participants speak for a specified amount of time, maybe five minutes. When time runs out, they leave the fishbowl and a new group from the audience enters the fishbowl.

This continues until most audience members have spent some time in the fishbowl. Once the final group has concluded, close the fishbowl and summarize the discussion.

In a timed discussion, let the people in the fish bowl discuss the topic for a certain period of time – say, 15 minutes. Then stop the discussion and invite the people who aren’t in the inner circle to give feedback on what they heard in the fishbowl.

To use the fishbowl exchange, divide the group into two smaller groups; have each of these groups meet separately and come up with three or four open-ended questions for the other group. Have them write their questions down; reconvene and exchange questions.
Form two circles, one small group inside the other, both facing inward. Have the fishbowl (the inside group) read a question and discuss it. The outside circle cannot speak, only listen.

Go through all the questions, making sure everyone in the fishbowl gets to speak. Now switch circles and go through the process again.

Idea Bombardment

This activity will help your group generate ideas for achieving personal and group goals. It provides a way for the group to “bombard” one or a small group of people with ideas for accomplishing their goals.

Start with the whole group in a large circle, then spend about five minutes talking about how to set goals–making them realistic, short-term so they can see progress, and about things they really want. The group may set personal goals for things like fitness, doing better in school, having more fun or learning a new skill. Or they may set goals for the group to accomplish something like a service project or a trip. Don’t get hung up on the writing part. The more often you do activities like this, the better people will get at setting goals. Just remember to give people opportunities to talk about how their goals are going and what they may need to do differently.

Now have each person write a goal on an index card.

Go around the group and have everyone share their goal, listening for others in the group that have similar goals.

Now, group members with similar goals take them into the center of the large group and form a smaller circle.

The group in the outside circle “bombards” the inner circle with ideas for accomplishing their goals. Those being bombarded may want to take notes about their favorite ideas. Rotate different small groups into the inner circle, giving the bombardment five minutes or less for each small group.

Pleasure Meter

The Pleasure Meter is a good activity to start discussion early in a program, but not right at the beginning. It acquaints participants with each other, indicates preferences and lets us find out about the other members of our group. It can help you learn about the participants and may help your group define sexual behavior. As you discuss pleasure and then sex, encourage the group to include sex by yourself as sex, discuss roadblocks like health, culture, shame and religion.

Pleasure Meter

Pleasure Meter

With one Raccoon Circle, make an arc shape like the one shown here. This is your pleasure meter. Ask participants to stand along the edge of the meter, at the position that best relates to them. For example, the amount of pleasure that you have right now could be just like a gas tank gauge (empty, half a tank, full). Then have them move along the edge according to the amount of pleasure the following types of people “should have;” you don’t need to do all of them. And don’t define “pleasure.”

  • Infant
  • Toddler
  • Pre-school-age child
  • Kindergartner
  • Grade school student
  • Child with ADD
  • Someone in a wheelchair
  • Middle school student
  • High school student
  • College student
  • Someone in their 20’s
  • Pregnant woman
  • People in their 30’s and 40’s
  • Retired people
  • People in nursing homes
  • Octogenarians
  • Geezers

As the group arranges itself along the meter, ask them questions about:

  • What are you thinking about when I say pleasure?
  • What are some roadblocks to feeling pleasure?
  • Where do you get pleasure?
  • Why do red flags go up when we connect pleasure with certain groups?
  • How do you define pleasure?
  • Think of an activity you consider pleasurable–would you answer the phone when you are doing this activity?
  • What would you put on a “Pleasure Menu?”

Go Ask Alice

It’s so important to have reliable information when kids come to us with questions about sex. Or at least we need to be able to FIND that reliable information. This is a great resource for that kind of info–a Health Q & A Service of Columbia University.

It has an extensive archive, a search function and is very user friendly and interactive. There are sections on sexuality, sexual health and relationships as well as general health issues. The web site is about 14 years old but still highly relevant and edgy.

In the fall of 2007, I had the pleasure to attend a keynote address and workshop by Judith Steinhart, who was involved in starting this resource at Columbia University in New York City. She is AMAZING! I learned a lot from her; she became a sex educator quite by accident. One of her students asked her about getting condoms and she was off! I developed an activity for “Becoming an Approachable Adult” called the Pleasure Meter that is based on an activity she facilitated with about 350 people. Check it out.

That’s Not Cool

This is a pretty funny video about what might happen if you talk to your parents, counselor or boyfriend about “textual harassment.” It was developed by Brandon Hardesty and you can also find it on thatsnotcool.com.
Here’s what Brian says about it–
“A PSA I did for Ad Council. I filmed this about three weeks ago. Ad Council asked me to make a video for their website, That’sNotCool.com. It’s part of a whole new PSA campaign. I’m pretty sure they’ve asked some other YouTubers to make videos, so don’t be surprised if this isn’t the only one.”

This video about what might happen if you talk to your parents, counselor or boyfriend about “textual harassment” is pretty funny. It’s a good example of how NOT to listen to kids talk about sex!

It was developed by Brandon Hardesty and you can find it and other videos on thatsnotcool.com. There are also “callout cards” and other resources.

Here’s what Brandon says about his video–

“A PSA I did for Ad Council. I filmed this about three weeks ago. Ad Council asked me to make a video for their website, That’sNotCool.com. It’s part of a whole new PSA campaign. I’m pretty sure they’ve asked some other YouTubers to make videos, so don’t be surprised if this isn’t the only one.”

See Polk County Conservation Surveys

This program evaluation measures progress of clients toward goals of–

  • deeper respect and connection with nature
  • sharing knowledge and experience with others
  • becoming greener in their behaviors around energy and the environment.

Patrice Petersen-Keys, the other naturalists at Polk County Conservation and I have worked on this during the last couple years, here are links to surveys–

and links to the results

Play

Play is a most important element of creativity. People know me for bringing toys to meetings to engage our playful side as we work. Building play into collaboration builds trust, encourages communication and open interaction. Taking time out to play when I’m struggling with a project will loosen the gears and help me focus again.  A walk, playing with Bitsy or weeding the garden can loosen my mind enough to find the way to move on.

As I listened to Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett interviewing Stuart Brown, a physician and director of the National Institute for Play, I thought of times I’ve spent playing with friends. Jill and I creating Jill and Martha’s Relay. Eric with two yellow domes behind his ears to help hear me yelling across the field. Creating the cow milking lesson with Jody.

This Speaking of Faith webpage and podcast may open up some new ideas for you; it did for me. AND it justified my sometimes circuitous routes to accomplishing tasks. They’re talking about how important play is to the development of animals and children and how we need to keep play in our lives for the duration. I recently was in a meeting and Allen Cooper of the National Wildlife Federation used this slide show in his talk; it still sends shivers down my spine.

As I listened to Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett interviewing Stuart Brown, a physician and director of the National Institute for Play, I thought of times I’ve spent playing with friends.  Jill and I creating Jill and Martha’s Relay.  Eric with two yellow domes behind his ears.  The creation of the cow milking lesson with Jody.
This webpage and podcast may open up some new ideas for you; it did for me.  AND it justified my sometimes circuitous routes to accomplishing tasks.  They’re talking about how important play is to the development of animals and children and how we need to keep play in our lives for the duration.
Play is a most important element of creativity.  People know me for bringing toys to meetings to engage our playful side as we work.  I like to build play into collaboration because it builds trust, communication and open interaction.  If I’m struggling with a project, taking time out to play will loosen the gears and help me focus again.
A walk, playing with the cats, or weeding the garden can loosen my mind enough to find the answers.  I was talking with my neighbor the other day about a practice she uses that encourages all of us to find answers within ourselves.  I hope this site helps you find some of those answers.