Follow up activity in Bucharest, Romania

Dears,

Long time since I did not write on this blog anymore, and I missed it!

But now I write from my home, in my bed… and not in Estonia. But still, remembering all those things makes me feel good J

So, what is the reason for writing? To share with you all what I have done here in Romania as follow-up activity after the TC in Estonia, on stereotypes and prejudices.

When I came back to work from wonderful Estonia, I was talking to my boss at a coffee about how it was in Estonia. And, among others, I told her that I should have a follow-up activity here in Romania, regarding this topic. And guess what she tells me? Wouldn’t you like it to do it here with us, in our team? I thought of it….yep! It sounds good to me. Why not? As for the logistic part, it would be much easier! I have an easy to get room at the office, I would have all the stuffs such as pens, chart papers, markers etc etc.

So… I send invitations, I searched for a second co-trainer and here we are on the 9^th of March. Ah yes, about the co-trainer. As you can easily imagine, I could not do it as the trainers (s) should integrate in the group discussions and facilitate the activities. So, I had a good friend the works in the same place with me and she was excited about the idea.

The agenda, briefly, was about to contain: team building, my identity molecule, a small break, energizer, greetings, cafeteria and discussion.

I write beforehand the chart papers for the cafeteria and for the molecule.

It was something quite familiar with what we have done in Tartu: half a day training and more or less the same activities.

So, here are the activities in more details: in a Friday afternoon, 15 people gathered in Bucharest for a workshop on stereotypes, discrimination and prejudices.

We started with an energizer and to get to know each other better. Although we are colleagues at work, we do not know too many personal things one about the other.  In order for me to participate as well, I asked the co-trainer (Gabi) to make this energizer for is: arrange according to the age, talking, in a semi circle. Then, arrange according to the number of brothers, only saying yes or no and the last one, arrange according to the sign of the zodiac, not talking at all. Pretty fun it was!

Then, on the agenda we had another energizer: the 1,2,3….molecule ( now, molecules of 2!, molecules of 3! People walking around and suddenly gathering in small molecules and then walking again), but we were a bit tired physically after the first one so we decided to go directly to the next part: the identity molecule. Of course I spoke a lot before with Gabi about what and how to do, I told her how we did it in Estonia, both in Vidrike and in Tartu, what other activities we had and we have chosen together what best fits.

Now, the molecule: I explained the rules of the game to everybody, made the distinction of what should and what should not be included in the identity (not features of personality); first, I shared mine:

Sister, divorced parents, explorer (thank you Heleri for inspiration :) ), volunteer and mathematically thinker.

Afterwards, Gabi shared hers:

 

Then, we shared post-its and papers to everybody, explained the rules and let then thinking for 10 minutes about their identity….

People going to other corners of the room….

So, what is the post-it for and what is the paper for…? J

Counting… guess how !

Uks, koks, kolm .. J

Give some guidelines…

Here we go into small groups for a half an hour to discuss… and discuss… and discuss….

I had again the same great experience as in Estonia: people that do not know each other that well, find that they have do many things in common! Guys, we only have two minutes left OK? Ahhh… only two minutes? L

I also was in a discussion but went sooner to write down all the words on the chart paper. Not sure how much you will understand, but some are comprehensible:

Some of them: Bigger sister, analytical, observer, family oriented, atypical Aries, silent, daughter, cultural diversity, sister, faith, study, travel, water, desert, movement, woman, books, seeking, catholic, art, French language etc….

Then, we came back in the big circle and sit and stand, sit and stand for the words that we felt that we identifies ourselves, does not matter whether we wrote them or not.

The words are over,  let’s have a sit now and debate a bit this. How was it to choose the words? For some of them difficult, for some others easier… how was it to stand up when you were in a small group? I felt special J what about when you were in a big group? I felt.. covered. And some more debate on it.

Ok, time for a break J

We had some cookies and other goodies ….

And here we are back in business…  in a fishy business, as we played piranha game! Some newspapers and islands, many fishes walking here and there, piranha attacks! J

Fast, fast come on our island ! 

Then…everybody let’s make a world tour and salute all the others in our own. And as we travel, let’s learn how others greet. Yes! The greetings activity !

Now, let’s breathe and take a coffee… in the cafeteria J

I had written all the papers beforehand and they were all on tables already.

We counted in turkey 1, 2, 3…bir, iki, uc J

Topics: roots of discrimination, how to fight the discrimination and the quadrant (victim, attacker, bystander and confronter). Just as we did in Tartu.

I adjusted a bit the activity: on one table there were all the three of them. The first to be discussed and filled in was the one with the roots, then how to fight and then the quadrant. Why I did this/ because… people did not have enough previous knowledge about the topic and it would have been quite weird to go straight to the quadrant. What to write? What do you mean by “I was discriminated”? So, first they brainstormed about the roots, then find some solutions and in the last time, remember some personal situations….

Here are some of the outcomes we had:

Team / topic	Roots of discrimination	How to fight discrimination
Team 1	Generalization Education Personal negative experiences Negative examples Intolerance Lack of consequences ( punishments for discriminating) Inability to understand and / or accept  new concepts Inequality Lack of programs for fighting discrimination Ignoring the problems of minorities Generalizing negative experiences	Renouncing at your own prejudices Social integration programs Creation of equal chances for each At professional level – objectivity of choice
Team 2	Lack of information Ignorance Prejudices Own personality issues Personal wealth Inability to understand differences	Education Objective information ( mass media – pros and contras) Legislation Social programs
Team 3	Origins Color Social class Sex Disabilities Sexual orientation Clothes Religion Culture Mentality	Education in the family Social programs Targeted trainings ( for youth, for children, for adults) Mass media Exchanges ( for students and for professionals) Multiculturalism Flash mobs

For the quadrant we also had quite interesting ideas. Some were personal experiences about: discrimination because of appearance (clothing), or because the attitude ( hippy style, arrogant -> generalization), desire to get involved in a certain activity when someone had a very different background – people had prejudices and were not very willing to integrate her; regional discrimination (people coming from Moldavia); bad experiences with Romanians in Italy ; communication with the Indian colleagues ( we as attackers – they do not very complex jobs and because of this, we tend to disregard them);

After each team presented their discussion, we came back in the big circle and sum up the cafeteria activity.

Among other debates, each said one word or idea that is the most important for him / her from this workshop. Here are some of them: calm atmosphere, good trainers J , structured workshop, awareness, flash mobs ( most of them did not know about it), forum theatre, the consequences that the small things may have, the greetings J

Here we are at the end of the workshop now.

I also had a feedback form, that was filed in by 10 participants, and here are the questions, and near them the number of respondents. For the open questions, I have gathered here all the answers. 

Workshop on stereotypes and prejudices

and team building

A.    The trainers’ knowledge about the subject was:

1. Excellent 5
2. OK 5
3. Poor

B.     How was the duration of the workshop?

1. Too short. Couldn't learn enough in such a short time.2

2. A little too short 3. Just fine

4. A little too long   8

5. Definitely too long. The concepts could be learned in much less time.

Comments and suggestions.

C. Were the trainers helpful with practical activities?

1. No, not enough

2.

3.

4. 9

5. Yes. The instructor definitely helped to make the activities a learning opportunity.9

D. How do you rate workshop conditions (room size, equipment, environment...)?

1. Poor.

2.

3. 2

4. 5

5. Very 2

E. How well was the workshop organized (the schedule)?

1. Not well.

2.

3. 1

4. 3

5. Very well 6

F. Thinking about your day to day life, how useful was this workshop?

1. Not useful.

2.

3. 1

4. 3

5. Very useful. 6

Comments?

The quadrant part

Discrimination topic – thinking more  about Discrimination and taking action on it

G. What did you like most about the course?

Knowing each other

Everything

The games J

The sitting and standing from the molecule activity

Finding new things about the others

Nice atmosphere

The trainers facilitated very well the course

Excellent atmosphere

Materials

Structure

Discrimination topic

The discrimination part

Identification of things that build our identity (molecule)

I liked the fact that we had many activities and interactions between our team.

H. During today workshop what activity you like the most??

1. My identity molecule 8

2. Greetings 1

3. Cafeteria (roots of discrimination, how to fight discrimination and the quadrant) 1

I.       What would you recommend changing about the training?

More cookies

The molecule – more trainings on this

I would not change anything, it is good, I would put even more activities in it to give the possibility of interaction.

J. Overall rating

1. Very disappointing

2. Disappointing

3. A little bit disappointing

4. OK 1

5. Pretty good 4

6. Very good 2

7. Excellent 3

K. Other comments, observations, suggestions:

Million thanks for facilitating such an interesting , structured workshop ! great job

Overall it was a very nice team activity

Great job

Thank you ! J

So my dears, this was my workshop... and if i had any expectation, it definitely exceeded it. It was fun, entairtaining, useful, a learining opportunity for all of us, a chance to know each other better and most of all, to become more aware of the issue of discrimination. What have I learned from this activity? :) There was one idea mentioned at a point.. that the small things we do or say for others may be of a huge effect...for us it may mean zero, while for the other one might mean so many things.

I wish you a lot of good luck in your activities, though I am sure that they will all be successfull !

Adriana