Important note regarding the copying of programmes

Aims / Objectives :
Aims

• To develop their skills of working in and being part of a tzevet
• To look at the importance of good communication, support and giving and receiving feedback
• To teach skills in writing and running peulot together and methods of communicating during sessions

Trigger :
Trigger – 10 mins

Play the “get into xyz order” (eg height, show size, age, first letter of first name, last letter of last name, darkness of hair colour, length of hair), with no talking, and no hand gestures; strictly “eye contact” only. This will be very difficult. Then allow gestures – a bit easier. Then one person is allowed to talk; they will hopefully take the lead and organise everyone else. Then finally have one more round (something fairly hard – first letter of post code) but everyone is allowed to talk.

Analyse the game a bit. Why is it hard without communication? Even when they were not competing against each other or anyone else, why did they all get frustrated at how long some of them took? Why did they get annoyed at each other (if they did)?

Main part of the programme :
Method – 45 mins

Explain that the game is a metaphor for being in a tzevet. A tzevet can only function properly if 1) everyone is pulling in the same direction 2) everyone understands the strengths and weaknesses of others 3) everyone communicates.

Then they are going to be given a task: in groups of three, they have to create a paper aeroplane that will stay in the air for the longest time. Their only resources will be four sheets of A4 paper, one pencil/pen and one pair of scissors per team. They also have to design and create a logo for their team, and I will judge who has the best logo. It must be on a separate sheet of A4. They have 15 mins.

Let them do the task, and then have the competition. See who wins. Get them back into their groups and ask them to critique how well they worked as a group, thinking through three stages: a) planning – who took leadership? Who was having the ideas? Was anyone no inputting? b) delegating – which tasks did different people do? Did the whole team tackle one problem, then another, then another, as a group, or did one person do the logo, one do the plane and one do nothing? c) the result: how did they end up doing? Why did they do as well or badly as they did? Was their goodness/badness due to their teamworking skills? They get 10 mins for this

Then they will give each other feedback (10 mins). Each person gets 3 minutes of uninterrupted time to tell their teammates what they thought of them. Only stipulation is that, for every criticism, there must be an actionable improvement suggested.

Last 10 mins we will gather as a group and have a group discussion about communication strategies (highlighting the importance, for example, of having a choveret (if there is one); of sitting next to one another if two of you are running a session; of running through the session before you start to make sure everyone is clear (maybe in the tzevet meeting); of using non-verbal cues to point out incidents as they happen (chanichim misbehaving, it being time to move on to the next part of the activity, getting people quiet

Conclusion :
Sikkum – 5 mins

Sum up what we have all learnt from the session. Reminder that a tzevet can only function properly if 1) everyone is pulling in the same direction 2) everyone understands the strengths and weaknesses of others 3) everyone communicates. Explaining the point of feedback, and why for something like paper plane building it feel pointless, but as a tzevet it is utterly essential (and it happens on all ljy events). If time, finish with the ultimate in non-verbal games: a good old game of wink murder!

Resources:
stuff we will have there, but I need to reserve two pairs of scissors

Notes:
None