Girls First - Diverse Connections

Happy New Year! We started 2018 off with a meeting testing activities for the Girls First

program! The theme for the evening was "Diverse Connections". As we are asked to keep the details of the test activities confidential, I can't share exactly what we did - but here is an overview of how the evening went:

As the Guides arrived, each Patrol was asked to make a list of things they like for use in one of the later activities. They took attendance and collected dues before our usual opening.

In our first activity, the girls were asked to move to different places in the room based on how much they liked or disliked an item (i.e. YouTube, Broccoli, Math, Stranger Things). This activity went fairly well and the girls commented that they had learned things they didn't know about each other. 

Next, we did an activity that was very similar to one from we did last year as part of the NSP: Action on Poverty. Girls were given a coloured card and had to move according to the instructions given with various statements about socio-economic factors. This activity went fairly well, with some interesting comments about how the girls felt in the different positions. 

Although these activities involved some movement, the girls were getting restless so we paused here for a game break and played Squirt.

For the next activity, the girls were divided up into small groups and had to find something they all had in common and something they all felt differently about. This was repeated with the groups getting progressively larger. The first round of this activity went well, but later rounds were 'boring' (doing the same thing) or 'frustrating' (too many people to find things in common and something that makes each of them unique). The girls did comment that it's good for people to think differently and like/dislike different things as it would be pretty boring if we all thought/felt the same way.

Our final activity was making up skits - which most of our girls enjoy. Before starting, we brainstormed a list of situations where people could be teased or excluded. Each Patrol had to pick one of the scenarios make up a skit showing the problem and a skit showing how they could resolve the problem. Overall these were well done and stayed on topic. 

We ended by evaluating the activities and the discussions we had throughout the evening. The results were mixed and although we didn't run into any major problems, the overall feeling was that these weren't 'fun' activities - the phrase 'school-like' was used by some. Our feedback has been submitted and will be looked at by the Girls First Team as the new program is created!

To keep up with what is happening, follow the Girls First Page!