ORGANISATION: Citizens In Power(CIP)
ACTIVITY 9
ERASMUS + FATI PROJECT
‘See Refugees in the Eyes’
What?
A psychological experiment for multi-cultural bonding
Educational use
This activity has been inspired by an idea of ‘Amnesty Poland’, an organization who decided to bring Europeans and refugees together. More specifically, the activity ‘Looking refugees in the eyes’, created by ‘Amnesty Poland’, has been based on the findings of an American psychologist who –twenty years ago- created a four-minute staring experiment in order to help people bond. As those studies suggest, it only takes four minutes of direct contact for strangers to fall in love. The results of ‘Amnesty Poland’ idea, who applied the four- minute staring activity to pairs of people, consisted of one European and one refugee, with the aim to bond them, could be found in a video that Amnesty has created in order to record those results
Benefits/advantages:
As has been shown by previous results of such activity, this workshop will manage to create a strong bond amongst participants (Europeans and refugees), whilst simultaneously cultivating feelings of empathy, mutual understanding and compassion, thus establishing the cohesion amongst the group.
-Participants will have the opportunity to follow an inner-path in order to learn how to put themselves on the shoes of the person they have in front of them, thus acquiring feelings of sensitivity and compassion.
-Participants will comprehend the common human nature regardless of nationality, ethnicity and religion, thereby achieving one of the main targets of this training, which is multi-cultural bonding.
Limits:
-The facilitator should set the ground by preparing participants accordingly, in order for the conduction of the activity to be considered as ‘successful’. Otherwise, participants might feel a little bit weird in case that they are not prepared accordingly, thus not letting their feelings to be communicated.
-The activity should be held in a relaxing and cozy environmental context, capable of making the participants feel comfortable and relaxed.
How to use it?
The activity should be accomplished at the beginning of the first day of the training, with the aim to make the participants feel bonded. One of each refugees will form a pair with a European participant. The pairs should remain silent for four minutes, by simultaneously staring at each other. After the time limit, they will be allowed to talk to each other, forming questions or just describing how they felt.
Subsequently, all participants make a circle in order for the trainer to help them analyse the experimental process they had gone through, by primarily urging them to talk about their invoking feelings, or even to share some of their thoughts while applying the experiment.
To conclude, the trainer shows to the team the video provided within the link, under the section ‘Resources and Availability’. Participants are free to comment on it.
The process could be recorded by a cameraman, after taking participants’ permission. Slightly after the training, the cameraman prepares a professional video with the results of the activity, on behalf of the coordinator. Subsequently, the organization will share the video with both its partners and other public and private organizations that belong to its network, to disseminate the results.
Methods: experimental process/ psychological experiment
Duration: 1 hour
Participants: mixed group of migrant/refugees and European (half-half). Participants will form pairs; each of the pairs should be composed of one migrant/refugee and one European citizen.
Materials:
-Laptop and a projector, for the provision of the video in the end of the activity
-a professional camera, in case the trainer would like to record the results
Procedure: Described under the paragraph ‘How to use it?’
Resources & availability:
ACTIVITY 10
ERASMUS + FATI PROJECT
What?
‘Providing mental health to young refugees through various forms of therapy’
Educational use
Educative series of videos which can assist youth workers on the psychological aspects of integration of young populations, by proposing various forms of ‘therapy’, such as art-therapy, music-therapy and sand-therapy which could heal multiple forms of ‘traumas’.
Benefits/advantages:
-All the information is being provided within interesting videos that contain vivid images deriving from realistic contexts, whilst explaining practically the main parts of the process that has to be followed by the facilitator.
-The way the workshop has been structured promotes further research and study on each video’s content, by also preparing the ground for deep discussions and exchange of experiences.
Limits:
-The attendance to this particular workshop is -by no means- an adequate training for the applicability of the method. Accordingly, the content of the videos should be considered as a source of inspiration, on the basis of which the trainer should conduct a more in-depth investigation of the subject.
How to use it?
-As a first step, the group is being divided in four sub-groups. Each group is invited to watch one of the videos, the links of which are being given within the paragraph ‘Resources & availability’. Subsequently, each group should analyze the content of the video, whilst in parallel answering to the following questions:
(i) Which therapeutic methods are being presented?
(ii) By using your laptops, please make a further research on the methods proposed, therefore trying to identify the real process that is being applied by the therapists in each of the cases.
(ii) Present your findings to the rest of the groups, by making an extensive reference to the ways in which a method is being applied.
As a last step, all the groups should present the results they have come up with to the resting participants. As a conclusion, it’s being suggested for the trainer to assist the groups to proceed to a comparison of the methods analyzed in the presentations.
However, the trainer should always remind the participants that only qualified therapists with specialized knowledge could apply the method in the expected way, as well as that this workshop is by no means an adequate training to do so. Although, trainers could make use of the methods proposed, in order to come up with creative activities that could be used in similar contexts.
Duration: 2 hours
Participants: psychologists, psychotherapists, young workers, social workers, volunteers
Materials: laptops, projector, flipcharts, pens and markers
Procedure:-
Resources & availability:
-Art therapy for Refugee Children: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVflDJEyaZk
– Creative Arts Therapy with Children: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGxpo3fD41E
-0 to 5 in 30 Minutes! Sand Play Therapy:
-Play Therapy Works!:
