Top It Off (A Share from Karen) Building Lesson Part 1

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Our FUNdoing friend Karen W. sent another gem for us. I was going to simply share it, but I got this idea for 'Building Lessons' that I want to try with you (it could be the start of a new FUNdoing series like What? and Why? over at OnTeamBuilding). I know Karen is open to the idea.

I'm going to present the activity to you the way Karen sent it to me - which is straight-up playable, and ready to go as is. It can address all sorts of learning opportunities (see Karen's Reflection Questions for her intended takeaways). 

Professional Development Opportunity. My challenge for you is to take what Karen gave us and tweak it to meet some other learning opportunities. In other words, how might you add to or change this activity in a way that aligns with your preferences or group objectives? (And I'd love to read what you come up with!) 

In the next FUNdoing Blog post, I will share some of my tweaks to diversify Top It Off (giving you a glimpse of how I look at and tweak activities). As Karen tells us, she's just started using this activity to explore how it works. I'm guessing she already has some tweaks of her own in mind. Here's Karen...

Good Morning Chris,

Thought I would share my new activity with you. So, this summer I made a Tube Switch set out of PVC and then I kind of stumbled onto a fun new activity. I call it Top It Off. It is still pretty new so let me know if you have any thoughts or ideas to improve it. Thus far I've had good responses to it. 

Note: You will see in the picture that I used all different random items. My favorite is this cheap boomerang I found at the Dollar Store- so unpredictable! Of course, you can use whatever you can find in your bag of tricks!

Top It Off

Time: 30 Minutes

Supplies: 26 Numbered tubes, 26 Numbered (or Lettered) Items (see pictures above), and 2 ropes [and a timing device].
 
Layout: One rope circle with randomly placed items marked with numbers 1 to 26 (Circle A), and one rope circle with randomly placed tubes (Circle B) marked with numbers 1 to 26. Rope circles are about six feet in diameter. Rope circles are about 10 ft. apart.
 
Basic Description: The challenge is to get all the numbered items from Circle A to Circle B balanced on top of the matching tube. The goal is to do it as quickly as possible with the least number of penalties.
 
Multiple rounds (e.g., two or three) are played, each with a 2-minute planning period.

Rules:

• Items must be thrown from one circle to the next. The item cannot touch the ground.
• Items must be placed on the tube with the same number in numerical order.
• You can only touch the items while in the circle.
• Only one person in each circle at a time.
• Everyone must throw at least once.
• Everyone must catch at least once.
• You cannot catch or throw 2 times in a row.
• Ropes cannot be moved.
• Tubes cannot be moved.
• If a tube gets knocked over after it has an item on it, there is a 5-second penalty and the item must be reset on top of the tube.
• If an item is not caught, it is returned to the throwing circle and they can try again. (No penalty unless an item and tube are knocked over.)
• All penalties will add 5 seconds to the end time.
• A 2-minute planning period is required before each round.
• The timer starts at the end of the 2 minutes.

Reflection Questions:

• Did your team use the planning time effectively?
• Who was responsible for the success or failure of the activity?
• What roles and responsibilities did your process include?
• Did any of the roles and responsibilities change after you started your process?  Why did this happen?

Learning Opportunity: As you were reading, what tweaks came to mind? What would you change, add, or subtract to meet other specific outcomes? We'd love to hear about them in the Comments. 

I'll share my thoughts in the next post.

All the best, 

Chris Cavert, Ed.D.