sport in nfe

CHANGE YOUR GOGGLES

Brief overview: This is an outdoor activity in which the participants will explore the sporting possibilities and obstacles at a certain place, from the marginalized people perspective.

Category of competence:
– Communication in your own / foreign language
– Social and civic competences, equality
– Cultural awareness, solidarity and inclusion
– Sense of initiative and entrepreneurship, proactivity
Duration: 3 hours 20 minutes
Target group: Y16+
Participants: 12-30 participants
Materials and setting:
– Old glasses or goggles you might have, or buy at the second hand shop
– Balls for football, basketball and volleyball, one for each sport
– Mobile phones to take pictures
– Computer and projector

Preparation:

Make sure you have sufficient number of glasses or frames. Goggles for swimming or skiing can be used as a fun association to a large variety of sports.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Step-by-step instructions for implementing this method.

Step 01 – Do a brainstorming session with the entire group to determine the marginalized categories for this activity. This could be disabled people, migrants or newcomers in town, certain social groups such as children with single parent, etc. (20 min)

Step 02 – Ask each participant to choose one role. Explain the task is not to act as the chosen role, but rather to observe the surrounding and imagine the situations this role would go through. What would it be like to be in that person’s shoes?

Step 03 – Split the participants in three groups, based on three sports (basketball, football and volleyball). Explain the task is to go outside, explore the surrounding and try to play the given sport. The goal is to determine are there courts, how reachable are they, are they available to everyone, and any other difficulties the marginalized groups could have reaching them! Tell to the participants that if there are no official courts nearby to try to play in the improvised, safe environment they might organize themselves.

Step 04 – Ask participants to be highly imaginative and not to observe only the physical aspect of playing sport. They should also think of the organizational and social aspects that different groups might face.

Step 05 – Instruct the participants to take pictures as a documentation of their findings. The selection of pictures should be given untitled upon return. Each picture represents the certain marginalized group.

Step 06 – Hand out the glasses / goggles to the participants. Let them go outside and do the activity. (2 hours)

Step 07 – Upon their return, display the untitled pictures to all the participants so they could guess to which marginalized group it is related to. Then, ask each team the present and explain their view on the pictures. (30 min)

Step 08 – Debriefing (30 min)
Continue on the presentation of pictures / the exhibition and open the structured discussion. Ask the participants the following question:
– What happened? Did you enjoy the activity? Why? Why not?
– What was the most surprising thing you discovered?
– Why did you choose the example you did?
– How would you rate the accessibility of the sport you played to the specific groups?
– What preconceived ideas or stereotypes did you have about the person you chose? Which influence did these have on how you did the activity and what you “chose to see”?
– Did the exercise enable you to empathize in any way with the person at the margin?
– What have you learnt about yourself?