Lesson 6 The aim of this lesson is to introduce the students to the community-building activities that will greatly support the creation of a strong community. The lesson will be in the month of November. All rights reserved. Reproduction of the material without Ventilens written consent is not permitted according to applicable Danish copyright law, © 2017 Ventilen Danmark

Community-building activities Contents Why community-building activities? Both teacher and student-led activities About the planning of activities for others Plan an activity 2 min. Go over the program for the lesson.

Community-building “I emphasize that each individual employee’s performance is of great significance to the company, but it cannot stand alone. Most tasks are solved by employees working together and contributing different skills to reach common solutions.”   Everyone must get to know each other. The academic and the social go hand-in-hand. Companies call it team-building – we call it community-building. 5 min. Community-building is an active word – something one must do. The goal is that the students will get to know each other across the classroom, so they will become good at working together and can be good colleagues to each other. When companies spend many resources on team-building, it is also in recognition that employees should get to know each other and do things together outside of the company’s usual setting so that they can become better colleagues and thereby perform better in the workplace. They call it team-building, we call it community-building, and the principle is the same. If students get to know each other better, they will also be likely to show greater tolerance and understanding for one another. It is easier to be considerate of people one knows. Refer to the quote from the Director of Nykredit that emphasizes a good sense of community between her employees – they are also skills that are valued when one, in the future, must search for a job. It could be nice to ask the students if they know of or have done community-building exercises in other contexts, e.g. in sports clubs, at a part-time job, in primary school, etc. Group Managing Director Bente Overgaard from Nykredit

Try a community-building activity [insert the name of the activity] 10 min. To give the students a taste of what the community-building activities are, you will initiate a teacher-led community-building activity. It is up to you which activity you want to choose, it should just not last longer than 10 minutes – it can e.g. be ‘Draw a circle,’ ‘Poncho,’ or ‘Clap in the dark.’ You can find all of the teacher-led community-building activities on www.projektnetwerk.dk under the tab ‘Community-building’ (‘Fællesskabelse’.)

Planning groups Everyone is in a planning group and must plan at least one activity for the rest of the class before summer vacation. There will be at least one student-led activity every month. There will also be teacher-led activities that will take place during class time. 5 min. It is you as the teacher who creates the planning groups, which are groups with 4 students each. You will inform the students which group they are in at the end of this lesson, when they must begin to plan an activity. You have in advance written in the planning groups in the calendar you find on the website. You upload this calendar onto the student intro, so all of the groups can see when they must plan an activity. The community-building exercises will continue throughout the rest of school. If there are more than 6 planning groups in the class, there can be months where several groups will do an activity – it can e.g. be in a month where there are special theme days arranged, or where the teaching will be a bit different than normal. It is also possible for a few groups to join forces and plan a larger activity together. Explain to the students that you as a teacher will also be in charge of some community-building exercises that will take place during class time – and you have hopefully already begun these activities. Both the teacher and student-led community-building exercises are there to strengthen the sense of community. You can read about the teacher-led community-building activities on the website under the tab ‘Community-building’ (’Fællesskabelse’).

About the planning of activities Everyone in class must be invited. The activities must be cheap or free of cost. The activities can take place either during recesses or after school. If the activities are planned during school time, they cannot last more than 30 minutes. Community is something we do for each other. 5 min. The planning group functions as the host for the activity and the students responsible must make sure that everyone is invited. Some students may have excuses for not participating, and others might hesitate and may need an extra invitation before they participate. The students cannot force their classmates to participate, but they can make sure that everyone feels they really have been invited. If there is time, you can discuss in class what else characterizes a ‘good host.’

Plan an activity Get together in your planning groups. You must now plan your own activity Get together in your planning groups. Look through the inspiration sheet. Plan an activity. If you would like more inspiration, you can go to www.projektnetwerk.dk The class login is: Username: [WRITE IN] Password: [WRITE IN] 20 min. You can now tell the students who are in planning groups together and ask the groups to get together. The students must find activities on their own, but the inspiration sheet can be a great help in the beginning, just as the students can find more inspiration for all kinds of activities on the website, where the class has their own login – remember to add it onto the slide.