Start exercises - Explore & Be(come) Yourself

• Citizenship
• Higher Education (degree)

Explore & Be(come) Yourself

start exercises

Calm yourself - Breathing exercise

breathe in

breathe out

3/5 minutes

Breathing exercise for everyone

Everyone sits or stands in a circle, the facilitator guides everyone to push their feet gently to the ground with attention. When participants are sitting down you can ask them to sit on their hands for a few seconds. After a while, ask the participants to  slowly remove their hands from underneath them without standing up. Observe any differences.

If participants are standing ask them to wiggle their ‘tail’. 

Start breathing in and out with attention and softness. While breathing in you can feel your mind opening up and connecting to the space above you. While breathing out, you notice feeling a bit more connected to the ground.

Game with words and movement

3/5 minutes

Game with words and movement for everyone

The participants are seated in a circle, there is one chair missing and one person has to stand in the middle. 

The first round, the facilitator will be in the middle. Each participant belongs to a word representing a category that applies to the topic, for instance: passport, constitution, pledge, rights, vote and the collection. There should be five participants per category. Create as many categories a needed. The person in the middle calls out a category name and everyone of this category has to get up and trade a seat. Note that no one can return to their own chair. The person in the middle also wants to sit and sees if he/she can take a seat. The one in the middle calls quickly another name of a category and so on. If the collection is called everyone has to trade seats. You can also mention multiple categories at once.

Trust your fellow citizen

Make groups of 6 - 8 people

One person stands in the middle, the others stand around him.

Fall slowly and trust your team to catch you by your shoulders.

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5 minutes

Trust your fellow citizen for teams of 6/8 people

Everyone is divided into groups of 6 to 8 persons. One stands in the middle. The others are standing around, the right leg in front and the left leg behind. The person in the middle falls and is being caught by always four members of the group at once. They catch the falling person by the shoulder and push the person gently back towards the middle. As the trust builds, the distance and speed can be varied.

This is a physical trust exercise that asks the participants to work together, be aware of the person in the middle and be alert. The participants also need to exert a certain level of self-control. Working together and preventing the urge to start joking. The person in the middle needs to trust the others but all participants need to trust themselves individually and have confidence in their group. The facilitator tracks safety.

Explore & Be(come) Yourself

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