Dodge ball
Dodge Ball
The activity is suitable to teach leadership
Number of people to be involved
2 teams of 8 to 12 participants in each
Space and Technical requirements
(materials)
A Sport hall or a pitch
Ball for volleyball or some other not very heavy
2 Equal teams of people not more than 10 in each
Session Objectives
(expected learning
outcomes)
> To raise awareness and teach leadership
> To discuss matters of different leadership styles
The session step by step (with timing and responsibilities)
TIME
DESCRIPTION
10 – 15 minutes
Usually a ETS session start with short warm up, then trainer can explain to the participants the following rules:
The group is split in 2 equal teams who play against each other (A and B).
The aim is by throwing the ball to touch a person from the other team without that he catches the ball.
If team A throws the ball and a person from opposite team B is touched by the ball, he goes behind the line of the team A.
If the person from the team B catches the ball he has the right to throw.
If team A didn’t manage to touch anyone or ball has been caught by someone from team B, then person who threw goes behind the back line of the team A. People from both teams standing behind the backline have the right to catch and throw the ball on the opposite team.
Persons behind the line can be saved and come back inside the field in case if someone from their team catches the ball.
This are the basic rules of the game called Ball of the prisoner or Matar in Spanish (in order to be more clear for you if I missed something in the explanation).
10 – 15 minutes
Part One
Explain the rules to participants and let them play 10 – 15 min. Then introduce that second round there is one more new rule. Each team should chose a representative (captain). When they choose him, tell that the rule is that only this person from both teams is allowed to speak. If somebody else speaks is same, as the ball has hit him so goes behind the line of the opposite team. Let play 10–15 min.
10 – 15 minutes
Part two
Next last part of the game everybody from each team receive and assignments on a little paper which should not be shown to others when they play. The assignments are:
– try to include everyone in the game
– be not interested in the game
– coach / lead the team
– be super enthusiastic and involved in the game
– play as normal
You can write the assignments several times according to the number of participants so that everyone received one. It is ok to have several people in the same role.
Then let a new play for 10–15 min.
30 minutes
Debriefing
This exercise raise awareness about leadership and how we act as leaders and how this is helping us to coordinate volunteers. Sport is the best way to see those effects and connect them to reality. For debriefing then you can ask the following questions:
• How was the game? How do the participants feel after it?
• What happened? (1st/2nd/3rd part) Were there any differences between the different parts and what were they?
• How easy/difficult was to play in the different parts of the game?
• Which one they like most and why?
• Regarding the 2nd part – how was to play as a leader and how was to play without speak? What was more easy/difficult and why?
• Regarding the 3rd part how easy/difficult was to play in the given role (usually this is the strongest part because for some people it is hard to not be interested if they like to play, and for some it is hard to be super involved especially if they are shy and so on. A hint might be that you give the assignments to people according to their personalities and not let them choose randomly in order to make it even more powerful). So ask to speak about the roles and how was each role.
• Next: Ask did participants learn something out of the game and what they have learned?
• Can they connect this game to a real life situation and which one? How usually we could connect such play to reality?
• Can they reuse the results of this exercise in their real life and how?
REPORT
(Synthesis of emerging key
issues, most important
outputs, results of the
session – that will be
included in the report)
Then according to how the discussion goes (if they manage to have some learning outcomes or they do not speak much) you may conclude telling that leadership is needed when you coordinate volunteers, especially if you work with a lot of them (ex: organizing a festival or campaign with hundreds of volunteers, etc) so they should be aware that there might be people who are over enthusiastic and super motivated, others less or they should look for them and make them interested, try to involve everyone in the same way etc.