Team up for Change—Week 10

Lesson Overview:

Students explore and establish team agreements, develop group cohesion and trust, and understand teamwork.

 

Lesson Objectives:

  1. Teach students how to be respectful and positive team members
  2. Help students develop internal and external rules for communication
  3. Team members work as team leaders and team members in team challenges

 

Lesson Activities:

  1. Teamwork Handout/Discussion
  2. Teamwork activity-“Keep Me Balanced”
  3. Risk Poem/Poster

4.   Journal

 

Lesson Plan:

A. Teamwork Handout                                     15 minutes                               

B. ”Keep Me Balanced”                                    20 minutes

C. “Risk” Poem/Poster                                     15 minutes

D. Journal                                                           5  minutes

55 minute total

 

 

*Note: Teamwork handout is to be reserved for classes that need help coming up with good rules.  A variation on this could involve writing some rules on the board, and reserving others for student-discovery.  Another variation might be to give each team one or two different rules, then come together as a class to share these rules and discuss why all of the rules (student-discovered and planned) are helpful.


 

 

Teamwork

   1.   Talk one at a time (don’t interrupt another student while she or he is speaking).

  1. Avoid being judgmental.
  2. Give everyone a chance to speak.
  3. Keep what is said in class confidential.
  4. Be open and honest.
  5. Look at people when you speak to them.
  6. Listen and discover, rather than giving advice.
  7. Don’t make fun of what other people say or do.
  8. Help each other out.

 

 

Nonnegotiable Rights:

  1. Everyone has the right to privacy (so students may pass if they do not want to share something too personal).
  2. Everyone has the right to confidentiality (anything shared in the room will not go out of it or be talked about elsewhere).

Everyone has the right to be respected.

 

 

 

 

* Have groups pick two which are most important and write those on the board. Have students defend their choices.

 

 

Challenge 4

            Design and implement a family program for your family to ensure they get five servings of fruits and vegetables a day.

 

 

 

 

“Don’t Laugh at Me” Peter Yarrow Productions

 

“Keep Me Balanced” Activity

 

Facilitator should have groups stand up and spread out (if necessary, go outside). Provide each group with a tennis ball and tell them they must pass the ball between each other without using their hands. The ball must not fall and they must have it make 10 revolutions around the circle.  Once the groups have completed the task, then the class will do this activity as a whole.

This activity will reflect back on effective communication and listening, as well as focusing on teamwork.


 

Risk

 

To Laugh is to risk appearing the Fool.

To Weep is to risk appearing Sentimental.

To Reach Out to another is to Risk Involvement.

To Expose our feelings is to risk exposing our True Self.

To place your Ideas and Dreams before the Crowd is to risk loss,

To Love is to Risk Not Being Loved in Return,

To Live is to risk Dying,

To Hope is to risk Despair,

To Try at All is to risk Failure,

But risk we must, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.

The man, the woman who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing,

is nothing.

 

 

 


 

“Journal Activity”

 

1. List one aspect of teamwork you learned today and how you will use it in your everyday life.

 

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