Energizer
Create a safe space without judgement.
Allow the participants to be silly
Remind participants to come wearing comfortable clothes.
Materials needed
✓ No materials needed
Proposed location
✓ Large location that allows participants to move freely
✓ a safe space where no one can look in from outside.
Steps
1.
Participants find a place in the space where they can move freely without bumping into each other.
2.
Each participant imagines having two magical objects: a large pot of paint in their favourite colour that is visible when painted in the air and a brush that they can attach to any part of their body.
3.
The facilitator ask them to attach the brush to a specific part of the body (see list below), dip the brush in the paint and write their name in the air as big as they can.
4.
After 30 secs/1 min, the facilitator asks participants to change the position of the brush and start writing their name again.
5.
Every once in a while, the facilitator reminds the participants to dip the brush in the paint again.
6.
After a while, the facilitator asks the participants to pick up the pot of magical paint and move to another part of the room and continue to write their name in the air.
Closing up
- Ask participants to walk about the room recognising and praising each other’s work, and to imagine all the other names colouring the air
and the room.
- Ask participants to “read the names aloud” which they can see (also to test how many names they remember)
To go further
- Here is a list of suggested body parts, decide which and how many to use, add some or make your own list…
index finger (once for both arms)
elbow (once for both arms)
shoulder (once for both sides)
chest
navel
upper back
tailbone
hipbone (once for both sides)
pelvis
knee (once for both legs)
foot (once for both legs)
head (write on the ceiling)
nose
tongue (move only the tongue)
eye (once for both eyes)(move only the involved eye, close the other)
Tips
✓
Do the exercise with the participants, and be silly, and confident in the silliness of your examples, so that they won’t feel judged.
✓
Challenge them to write their names as big as they can, they should strive to write every letter as big as their body, they can move as much as they want and in every direction (as long as they don’t bump in each other).
