Experience how Change to Chill activities can help teens stress less.
Teaching Others How to Chill
The best way to learn something is to teach it! This final session in the Change to Chill series focuses on Teach Outs, a way to cover a lot of information in a fairly short amount of time. Teens work in teams or individually to investigate something they can share with the larger group so that everyone has a chance to learn a new skill and stress less.
What You Need
- Electronic devices for each participant or one with a larger screen that can be seen by all
- Internet connection
- Smart Board or projector
- Pen or pencil (one for each participant)
- A soft object such as a ball or stuffed animal that can be easily tossed around a circle from one person to another
Step 1: Check In
Ask participants to say which activity or suggestion from the website they have tried since your last meeting. Ask them to describe what they did and what it felt like.
Step 2: Teach Out
Teach Outs are an effective, and often fun, way to cover a lot of information in a fairly short amount of time. The idea is for people to work in teams or individually to investigate something they can share with the larger group so that everyone has a chance to learn it. Divide your group into two teams. Ask one team to spend some time investigating the “Ways to Chill” portion of the website (in “How Can I Change to Chill?”). Tell them that their assignment is to teach the other group what they learn. This can be done through a skit, demonstration, group activity or whatever way they choose. Ask the second group to do the same thing with the “Get Some Perspective” part of the site. Tell them how much time they have to explore and plan and how much time for teaching.
After groups have presented remind them that the Change to Chill website is always there for them any time they have access to the Internet and that the skills they’ve learned over the past several sessions will be with them always as long as they keep up their practice.
Step 3: Meditation
Use the online five-minute video to provide participants with first-hand meditation experience. Invite them to get in a comfortable position. Inform them they can either watch the full video quietly or close their eyes and just listen. Either way, encourage them to follow the instructions and try the meditation. At the end take a few minutes to discuss what they thought of the experience.
Step 4: Reflect
As a final step in this new practice, take some time as a group to reflect on what you’ve done and what you’ve learned. Gather in a circle, sitting or standing. Then explain how the activity works. Say, “I’m going to ask a question. If you’d like to answer raise your hand and I’ll pass you the ball (or whatever object you have). Then once you are done you can pass the ball to someone else who would like to answer the same question.” When you are ready to ask a different question, ask that the object be tossed back to you. After the youth answer each question, you can take time to summarize what they said or expand on the thoughts they shared. Here are questions you can use:
- What did you like best about Change to Chill?
- What did you like least about Change to Chill?
- What did you learn by participating in these trainings?
- What are two or three words you can use to describe how you feel these trainings?
- What, if anything, will you do differently in your life because of the experiences you had through Change to Chill?
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