Results of the project: exercises

Exercise Title	Nessi’s Lake Water
Inspired by
General Aim	Make people cooperate and break stereotypes
Aim – knowledge	To show other people how stereotypes effect their choices
Aim – skills	Communication skills, breaking “rules” and stereotypes
Target group	everybody
Time (total)	5 minutes for introduction, 20 for the exercise
Introduction	the game is about 3 tribes that need to cooperate to survive using the water of a river/lake together, but because of stereotypes they don’t want to cooperate
Delivery step by step	1.      We explain a little bit of the game, without letting them know about the stereotypes 2.      Separate the groups 3.      Tell them the stereotypes of the other groups 4.      Let them think about a solution 5.      Expose the solutions and see how the stereotypes affect their decision
Summary	First we divided the groups and told them the stereotypes of the other villages and asked them to find a solution of dividing the lake they live at, taking into considaration the villages. Then we asked them to tell their ideas and we showed how the stereotypes affect and how we can break it.
Resources needed	People to separate into groups and give the instructions
Remarks, modifications
Critical points

Exercise Title	Stereotype Quiz
Inspired by	common knowledge about stereotypes
General Aim	To show that there are stereotypes everywhere
Target group	from 8 to 80
Time (total)	15-20 minutes
Introduction	Simple stereotypes quiz for 2 or more teams. The team that knows the most stereotypes wins.
Delivery step by step	In the middle there is a presentes that for each country starts saying some stereotypes. When one team knows which country it is, the team representative“ pushes the button” that is in the middle and if he was first the team can give answer.
Summary
Resources needed	Prepared stereotypes per country, paper and pen to write down scores. EXAMPLES OF STEREOTYPES: FRANCE: cheese, bagette, fashion ITALY: wine, hot women, pasta SWIZERLAND: chocolate, money, watch UK: tea, queen,, punctuality SWEDEN: heavy metal, IKEA, hot blonds NORWAY: cold, oil, vikings PORTUGAL: football, fish, beach ROMANIA: dracula, gipsy BRASIL: café, football, samba AUSTRALIA: cangaru, wild nature USA: junk food BELGIUM: waffels, beer Etc.
Remarks, modifications
Critical points

Exercise Title	The Banquet
Inspired by	exercise from intercultural training
General Aim	to gain some knowledge on stereotypes (what they are and what to do with them)
Aim – knowledge	to learn stereotypes on different nationalities and examples of people who brak them
Aim – skills	develop general communication skills
Target group	any group of people at age from 15
Time (total)	25-30 min
Introduction	The idea of the exercise is to give the participants an opportunity to confront with stereotypes concerning different nationalities
Delivery step by step	1.      Prepare a short CV (a new identity) for every participant. The CV should be written on a small piece of paper and consists of maximum 3 sentences 2.      Every participant must pick up one CV randomly, read it and not show to the others 3.      Participants go around the place as if they were at the banquet. They say hello to each other and try to find out something about everyone. BUT: they can only say the facts from their CVs. Every time they try to guess their partner’s nationality. 4.      After 10-15 min they finish the banguet and express their emotions/opinions/comments
Summary	usually the participants can’t guess their interlocutors’ identities because the statements are too misleading. The idea of new identities is only to get surprised and realize that sometimes people of particular nationality may differ very much from stereotype. The exercise gives the opportunity to explain that creating stereotypes is an unavoidable side-effect of the way in which human brain operates, because it likes making categories. However, stereotypes shouldn’t distract our attention from an individual person who may appear completely different from the stereotype.
Resources needed	paper, scissors, pen
Remarks, modifications	The statements in the CVs should be the opposite of traditional stereotypes, ex: FRENCH: I don’t like cheese. I can’t cook. I speak fluent English and I like this language a lot.
Critical points	An exercise may be perceived as complex and unclear, so give a very precise instruction. Divide the instruction into stages and after every stage ask the participants if they know what to do.
Exercise Title	Stereotypes Ball
Inspired by
General Aim	Make people aware of the stereotypes they hold
Aim – knowledge	What are stereotypes Assumptions vs stereotypes
Aim – skills	Realise how affected we are by stereotypes
Target group	Anyone
Time (total)	25 min (5 min for the exercise, 20 min for discussion)
Introduction	None
Delivery step by step	Participants stand in a circle. Trainer explains the rules and these are: - you throw the ball at someone and name a country, e.g. Spain, Poland, France, etc. - the person who catches the ball says the first association they have with the country, e.g. Spain – corrida, Poland – potatoes, France – Eiffel Tower, etc. - after couple of rounds the rules change. The person who throws the ball says not a country but a nationality, e.g. Spanish, Polish, French - the person who catches the ball says the first association they have with that nationality, e.g. Spanish – good dancers, Polish – welcoming, French – lazy, etc. After couple of rounds the trainer finishes the game and opens the group discussion
Summary	The discussion may go in many different directions, e.g. what are stereotypes, how common they are, what’s the difference between assumptions and stereotypes, etc.
Resources needed	A ball
Remarks, modifications
Critical points	If delivered in an international group it may happen that some participants will hear something they don’t like about their country/nationality. Trainer has to be able to manage the situation in such case.

Exercise Title	International Trip
Inspired by
General Aim	To gain some knowledge about stereotypes
Aim – knowledge	What stereotypes do we have
Target group	Everyone
Time (total)	30 min
Introduction	A quick and funny way to start discussion about stereotypes
Delivery step by step	Tell participants „You are a group of people from different countries and your task is to plan a trip together”. After that you give participants post-its with different nationalities (one nationality per post-it). They can’t look at them and should stick them to their foreheads. When participants are planning a trip they should talk to each other and treat other persons according to the stereotypes about the nationality on their forehead. Each participant should guess what nationality they are.
Summary	You ask participants how was this exercise for them, what did they learn in this exercise, what does it tell them about their stereotypes.
Resources needed	Post-it notes with written different nationalities
Remarks, modifications	It can also be with other characteristics, not only nationalities
Critical points

Exercise Title	Walk on stereotypes
Inspired by
General Aim	To feel and to see the how stereotypes influence us
Aim – knowledge	To show we all have stereotypes in society and realise we are all affected by them
Target group	Any group of people
Time (total)	30 min
Introduction	This exercise is to help people feel on themselves how stereotypes influence us
Delivery step by step	1. Ask participants to stand in one line, next to each other, all facing one direction 2. Give each participant a piece of paper with their roles (e.g. pregnant woman, gypsy, homeless person, Muslim woman, son of a president, etc) 3. Read 10 questions. If a person answers it with ‘yes’ they do a step forward, if they answer it with a ‘no’ they do not move 4. Ask people to tell what role did they have 5. Group discussion – how was it for you, how did you feel?
Summary
Resources needed	Paper, pens
Remarks, modifications
Critical points