Low Challenge Yourself
Hi lovely readers! I'm sorry for the late post, but I was viciously attacked by a deeply unwelcome fever yesterday, and I was therefore unable to post. I am still in the throes of that post-illness exhaustion, so this is going to be a fairly short post.
I wanted to tell you guys about another great response that I had from some kids during programming. Early in the school year, we do a lot of work with school groups that are focused on building teamwork and leadership skills. We have several types of activities to grow those skills, including low challenge. Our low challenge course is just that: a team challenge course with obstacles that are lower to the ground than, say, our high ropes course. These obstacles are designed to promote struggle, breaking barriers, and team bonding.
One of my favorite low challenge activities is the Yogurt Beam. I can't really give you a good reason for why it's called the yogurt beam, but sometimes we tell the kids that the beam is filled with yogurt, so hopefully that satisfies your curiosity. A few weeks ago, we had a middle school group come to visit us, and my small group started the low challenge course at the Yogurt Beam. The beam is literally just a wooden balance beam, and the group members have to organize themselves in a certain order without touching the ground. If anyone touches the ground, they have to start completely over. Sometimes certain members cannot talk or must have their eyes closed. This particular group worked pretty well together, but still had to start over about 10 times before they completely rearranged themselves on the beam without stepping off. After each low challenge obstacle, we do processing to see if the kids have (hopefully) learned something. I asked several questions, like "What qualities of a good team did you have to have for this activity?" and "If no one worked together, would you have been able to complete this activity?" After asking a few of these questions, I asked the one that I always save for last: "How does the Yogurt Beam activity represent our faith and our relationship with God?" Kids really do a great job responding to this question, but the group that I had that day really hit it out of the park:
I wanted to tell you guys about another great response that I had from some kids during programming. Early in the school year, we do a lot of work with school groups that are focused on building teamwork and leadership skills. We have several types of activities to grow those skills, including low challenge. Our low challenge course is just that: a team challenge course with obstacles that are lower to the ground than, say, our high ropes course. These obstacles are designed to promote struggle, breaking barriers, and team bonding.
One of my favorite low challenge activities is the Yogurt Beam. I can't really give you a good reason for why it's called the yogurt beam, but sometimes we tell the kids that the beam is filled with yogurt, so hopefully that satisfies your curiosity. A few weeks ago, we had a middle school group come to visit us, and my small group started the low challenge course at the Yogurt Beam. The beam is literally just a wooden balance beam, and the group members have to organize themselves in a certain order without touching the ground. If anyone touches the ground, they have to start completely over. Sometimes certain members cannot talk or must have their eyes closed. This particular group worked pretty well together, but still had to start over about 10 times before they completely rearranged themselves on the beam without stepping off. After each low challenge obstacle, we do processing to see if the kids have (hopefully) learned something. I asked several questions, like "What qualities of a good team did you have to have for this activity?" and "If no one worked together, would you have been able to complete this activity?" After asking a few of these questions, I asked the one that I always save for last: "How does the Yogurt Beam activity represent our faith and our relationship with God?" Kids really do a great job responding to this question, but the group that I had that day really hit it out of the park:
- "We have to depend on the help of other people in our lives to support us through our journey."
- " God is always there, even when I can't see him, like when people helped me when my eyes were closed."
- "We all have different paths in life, and we have to help each other get to those points."
- "Every time that we stepped off of the beam, you let us start over, just like God welcomes us back every single time we step away from Him and He loves us unconditionally."
It was a great moment, even all the greater because the head teacher had picked just that activity to stop in and watch my group. Before the group left, she said that was her favorite moment from their entire visit. I was glad that it wasn't just me who witnessed pure genius in that moment. I've said it before, and I'll keep saying it until I run out of breath, but kids are underrated in their intelligence and perceptiveness, and I find myself constantly learning from them. I'll leave you with this great quote from Emerson:
"Nature
never became a toy to a wise spirit. The
flowers, the animals, the mountains, reflected the wisdom of his best hour, as
much as they had delighted the simplicity of his childhood."
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