Cebu City - Until there is teamwork, nothing works. Barangay nutrition scholars had to become children again to know that they would have to work as a team to practically put malnourished cases to zero. There was just one problem, they did not quite know each other well.
During its fourth quarter gathering, the Federation of Presidents of Barangay Nutrition Scholars came to know more about effective teamwork and the idiosyncrasies of teammates in a seminar called, "Effective Teamwork: Key to Program Success."
While the nutrition scholars know each other by name, they did not quite understand the personality eccentricities of each deeply. In a game called, "What's up BNS?" participants were asked to choose a cartoon character that would best identify themselves. While the idea was to bring out the child of each participant, it also revealed the true personalities as adults. It is expected that drawing out the child in each participant enlivens an open attitude towards one another and become more open to fun dealings. The game is such that the character becomes their name all throughout the workshop.
With the "Draw Me Your Hand" game, the goal is to provide opportunities for participants to understand special personality of each other more especially on their particular reason for becoming a barangay nutrition scholar. This game is meant to look into the micro reasons why a nutrition scholar or participant can get attracted to a group. The rationale is that the similarities that teammates find with each other contribute to achieving goals in an organization with the fun of working in harmony.
In imbibing the need to work with others, a game called "Team Games" imbibes the value of self-denial and cooperation when working as a team. Sometimes in life, a person especially those working in a team must accept that he or she needs others like friends and family for help. If one person tries to build a house all alone, there is a lot of work to be done and it is a difficult task. But when a whole team pitches in and works together methodically and systematically, a complete house is built. Each person is part of the puzzle and can offer different talents that when pooled as one can build a complete BNS house with Christmas decorations. In this activity, each person is a part of a team that can make a big project easy and each person contributes his or her own skills to create the big picture.
A similar game called "Build A Mansion," requires teammates to group themselves into 7 to 10 members. Team members sit in a circle with a model mansion and materials like clay. When the whistle blows one person of the team starts building a castle as specified in the model. When the whistle blows again, the clay is passed to the next person and he starts building the mansion from where the first person left. The game continues until the mansion is made. The first team to make the mansion is declared winner.
The activity called "Creative Coloring," promotes the value that people need the discipline to practice to finish a group project. In this game, each member is given a different colored marker, crayon or pencil and inform them that this will be the only color they can use for this project. The group must now create a picture, using all of the colors. Each person may only use his/her color (no trading or sharing is allowed!). For example if the picture contains a tree, the person with the brown marker will draw the tree trunk while the person with the green will then draw the leaves.
To process the meaning and implications of team actions, a facilitator synthesizes and analyzes the dynamisms that took place with each member and each team. While the revelations told much of what members in the workshops did not quite know of each other, still it forged the teamwork they all needed all this time.
