During our morning session, we took the opportunity to get started on the big white sheet painting we had planned for our facilitation session. This actually last a good 20 minutes longer than anticipated, leaving us little time to conduct the dark room exercises later in the day. However, this could be saved for a later date so we didn’t get stressed.
The morning session went very smoothly with only a few minor hiccups. At first I was very comfortable with the idea of holding the students hands to help them finger paint and press their hands on the sheet, but after witnessing the reaction a lot of the kids had to physically contact, it was best to leave that to Jo and Andy to conduct. They would physically swing their arms if they didn’t like it and, to be quite honest, I really didn’t want to be in the line of fire when they’re are getting slightly rowdy. Ishmael really didn’t enjoy the painting and had to be taken out of the room as he was very unsettled by Cherry and myself being in the room. I’ve noticed that when Ishmael doesn’t like something he swings his arms before screaming, so in the future if I notice him swinging his arms, I’ll know not to do that task. The only other hiccup was with Adam, who started to drool and breathe very fast went in the presence of Cherry and I. He also wasn’t willing to have his hand pressed into the paint which was fine. Maybe he doesn’t like sensory tasks? Something for me to bear in mind.
Our actual facilitating session just consisted of Rush as the hall space audio system had a technical glitch meaning our time was reduced. This made me feel rather nervous as I didn’t really plan for things to go wrong, so I definitely need to be more prepared for if the worst happens. After this glitch was fixed, we were able to conduct the task. We only had Ersula and Adam as the others were undergoing physio. This made everything much easier as I couldn’t really handle a large group for my first facilitating session. This allowed me to ease into everything much easier. I was very happy with the response the kids gave us. Our choice of music (crazy frog and gummy bear) definitely were good choices as these songs were used in their rehearsal for their show, so they were familiar with them. I could tell they enjoyed by the sounds they made when being moved around quickly.
After my first facilitating day, I feel a lot more confident in what I was doing. I feel like I can come in next week with ideas and energy. Albeit it may be difficult with a larger group to plan for, but I feel happier knowing that I am capable of planning a workshop with some degree of success. The only things that threw me off guard were the reaction to the painting, which made me on edge and rather sceptical of what the kids were feeling as I didn’t want to hurt them or do anything that made them uncomfortable, and the tech problems - but that can be easily amended!
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