JYEP 2: complementary activities

Part two of my JYEP series - apart from drawing and coloring, there are many other ways we can help our Junior Youths understand the lessons, internalize the concepts, express their thoughts and feelings and unleash their creativity! Here I'm sharing with you examples of complementary activities I've done with my Junior Youth groups. Feel free to use/share!

I. Breezes of Confirmation

Lesson 3 (Dinner)

Activity: Career Ladder. Ask the students to draw a big ladder with 5 steps. On top of the ladder, they shuold write what they want to become when they grow up. Then on the first step (at the bottom) they should write What does a XXX do? Step 2: What do I need to study?

Step 3: What efforts should I make?

Step 4 and 5: What virtues do I need to practice? 

Lesson 5 (Prefer your brother)

Activity: Prefer your seatmate. Cut out heart shapes, and give one to each student. Ask them to write what they love about the person sitting next to them. Encourage them to describe each other with virtues. Let them write with colors, and if time permits they can draw borders/decorate the heart. In the end, decorate their softboard with the hearts, and while putting them up – read them aloud.  

Lesson 9 (A Special Place)

Activity: Thought bubbles. Cut cloud shapes, and give each JYs to write down things that they like to think about when they are alone in their special place/favorite place to reflect. Then ask a JY to draw a person thinking, then paste on the soft board like this:

Any lesson. 

Activity: Crossword Puzzle. Create a crossword puzzle (identify any 10 words from the book, which they should find). At the back of the page, you can ask them to make sentences with any three words.

Any lesson. Preferably after completing the book: a skit. So I wrote a skit for some of the Junior Youths. They act out Meeting Rose at the Bus - so there's Rose and Musonda who run excitedly to each other, there's Mr Mulenga who helps with the bags, then there's Musonda's siblings to welcome Rose at the door, and then Mrs Mulenga's who is cooking for everyone. Then when lunch is ready, everyone helps bring the food to the table. Here's the script for this part: 

[After a few minutes, they all sit on the dining table. Musonda’s brother picks up the bottle of water and is about to pour water for himself, but his sister says “me! Me! I’d like some water please I’m thirsty!” Then Godwin starts to sing “I am thirsty, I am thirsty, but my sister she is too, so I offer her some water, that’s what’s best to do” while pouring water into the glasses of everyone. Then everyone sings “It is a blessing to prefer your brother, this is the way to show you care, It is a blessing to prefer your sister, you are richer the more you share.”

Then everyone starts eating, talking, laughing. Then Rose says “I’m so happy to be here! I’ve really missed all of you! It’s such a joy seeing all my cousins acting so responsible in the house, helping each other – no wonder this is a very united and happy family!”]

*Doing talent shows, BINGO talent search, charades are really fun activities, and very relevant because the theme of finding your talent runs through the book. These activities also help the JYs know each other better. 

II. Glimmerings of Hope. 

Lesson 1. 

Activity: Observe your country. Work in pairs. Divide a big sheet of paper into two (just draw a line). On both sides, draw your country. Inside the left drawing, draw or write down the problems you see in your society. Inside the right drawing, write down or draw what the ideal society would look like. *I really enjoyed doing this activity on the first day of this book. You'll be really surprised with the things the JYs have to say about the country. I remember I once had an 11 year old say "a problem in India is that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer". After listening to everyone, you can pick some of the common answers and just get them to share their thoughts on the topic. Here they'll be looking at contemporary issues, and this is probably the only time they'll get to share their opinions (unless they talk about the news with their family at home). And the best part is getting them to share what could be solutions to these problems. Another reason why this activity was really useful is because in this first lesson, we read about Kibombi's country - two tribes, at war. Most, if not all, the JYs won't be able to relate because they're thinking oh an African country, oh a village setting, oh a tribal war. But change their perspective by asking them to think about the problems in their own society, and this will help them see the bigger picture better. 

Lesson 2. 

Activity: Overcome each other's fears. So the main character in the book just experienced something tragic/traumatic. Once again, might be hard for the JYs to relate to this experience, so instead... ask each student to write their biggest fear on a piece of paper (anonymously), then fold paper. Collect the chits then put them in a box and shake. Then ask students to come one by one to the pick a sheet at random, read out the fear and imagine how they’d tackle that problem/overcome that fear if it were their’s.

Lesson 3. 

Activity: Source of Hope. 
Cut out Stars shapes, and give one to each student. Tell the students to imagine they were Kibomi, walking alone in the dark, in the forests, feeling scared and hopeless. Kibomi remembered the wise words of his father and he felt better. What thought would comfort you if you were in his position? Write it on the star. They can write an inspiring quote, or write the name of a person (eg. Mom, Dad).

Tell them to paste this somewhere they can always see (eg. wall beside the bed, diary…)

Lesson 8. Activity: Inspiring Speeches. So in this lesson, Kibomi saw a man speaking into a microphone, attracting lots of listeners but Kibomi didn't like what the man was saying. So this is a good chance to ask the JYs about people they look up to - do you have a favorite public speaker? They'll say Malala, Prime Minister Modi, Dr Jagdish Gandhi, then you ask why. Then you can also get them to practice writing speeches/presenting them. In most cases, I gave the topic they had to write about. Then I selected some of the speeches, and told the JY to present their speech at the Assemblies of the Primary school section! *Suggested topics: safety (health, climate, crime); virtues (respecting elders, being a good friend); keeping our environment clean

III. Walking the Straight Path

Lesson 3. This is the lesson about the old man planting date trees for the next generation. Activity: Crafts with recycled material. Before this class, remind everyone to bring used up tissue rolls (the brown cardboard part). Also bring recycled paper and coloring material. Make shapes like these:

Lesson 6. This is the lesson about the frog. I found an animated video on youtube of this same story: (A Tale of two frogs) 

Then I also found another another video called the Little Frog – it's about about encouraging each other/ persevering and not giving up. Truth is, while going through this book, some of the JYs will tell you that they already know these stories. But then of course each chapter comes with questions and a quotation to study/memorize and that gives us a new way of looking at these stories. But another way to helping them enjoy the stories is by showing these videos. Honestly, try showing them a video of the turtle and the hare (even though they all know the story, this will be the first time for many of them to actually watch the video -- watch them go tense watching the turtoise! haha)

***

A good activity upon completing any of these books would be to create book marks. So this is art and service, because each JY would have to design a book mark (preferably write a quotation/prayer they learnt) and then give it to someone else as a gift. 

bookmarks I made for my Class 9 Animators, with quotations on
knowledge and education, which I gave them
just before their mid-year exams.