Today Denise, Tim (from the Ministry of Education) and myself did a half day Group Dynamics session with the students that are going to be involved with the Project this semester. We put all of the students into their working groups and they did an ice breaker using Skittles. Every student could take as many Skittles as they wanted, but not eat them. For each colour of Skittle there was a category that they had to say something about: i.e. for every red Skittle they had to say something about their family, every blue was something about the kind of music they liked etc.
Once this was finished, we got them started on a group task. Using limited materials, the students had to create an "egg catcher" that would catch an egg when dropped from above a door. The "catcher" had to be on the floor and the egg could not crack or break. Materials available were: paper, pipe cleaners, elastics, straws, popsicle sticks, sponges, string and tape. Students had 30 minutes to work together to create their product and then the dropping began. Most of the "catchers" were successful, there were approximately 5 out of 15 that either cracked or broke their egg. Overall, the morning was fun to watch and students were all busy and engaged. Next steps: get them going on their project.
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| The final "egg catchers" |
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Students at the beginning of the session
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