PICK OR TREAT – Group

The game is divided in 8 steps and it starts as a donation campaign (STEP 1), where the students are invited to bring old and non-used clothes that they or their relatives have at home (different types of clothes).

In STEP 2, the trainers check the datas about the water footprint for each item and prepare two wardrobes, one with high water consumption clothes (W1) and one with low water consumption clothes (W2).

In STEP 3, the teenagers will be split in two teams and each team will be assigned a wardrobe. They will have to pick clothes they like without being informed about the water footprint of each item.

In STEP 4, the two teams play the „STAFETA” GAME  (Round 1) – starting in point A – going in point B – dressing – going back to the group and passing the role to the next one

In STEP 5, the teenagers can have a discussion time about how they suceeded to win/ which were the criterias for choosing the clothes.

In STEP 6, the trainers raise awareness about the difference between the water consumption in the production of clothes in the two wardrobes.

In STEP 7, the two teams play a new round of „STAFETA” GAME but, being aware of the water consumption, team with W1 will have to use weights in the jeans/jackets (could be rocks, weights etc.) related to the water consumed in the jeans  production. Team with W2 will have to dress more clothes to match the same amount of water used in jeans production.

Team with W1 will be quicker dressing, but will be more slower doing the „STAFETA”, metaphoricaly translated by the motto „more haste, less speed” .

Team with W2 will take more time dressing, because of the amount of clothes they have to put on and take off and will be afected when trying to move, metaphoricaly translated  by the motto „slowly takes you far”.

After the game is concluded, the clothes donated are sent to a local institution of social benefit – STEP 8.

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Brainstorming about educational methods/dynamics for approaching the subject of jeans production (Ana, Iancu, Elena, Benjamin).

 Throw the ball!

The main aim was to help the process of understanding the phases of the jeans production and the impacts associated with this industry. The game can be structured in 4 different steps:

1) input about water subject ( age suited)

2) clarifying the game and highlighting its purpose (give some motivation)

3) playing the game

4) each student could then ask a question to one of his colleagues, by “throwing the ball”

The facilitator ask the first question and throw the ball to one of the students. If the student knows the answer he answers and can ask another question for another person (who is again appointed through the ball). If a participant do not know the answer he/she throws the ball to anybody else until there is somebody who answers.

Vizualize it!

Using different pots to proportion the amount of water needed to do something. We would need one big pot (ex: 12L) for the total amount of water and smaller ones (ex: 100ml) for the single production steps. To raise complexity there could be used colored water in order to show the different impact on blue, green and grey water, or compare the impact of sustainable/non sustainable products. The participants have to choose a particular step of the production of a pair of jeans. Than they have to get (somehow) the water out of the big pot which was needed for that step. Before it must be defined that (e.g.) 100ml stands for 1000l. After that students could write down the impact of not using water in a sustainable way how it may affect the social, economical, ecological and individual level.

Role playing

Each  student will receive a paper with a brief description of one phase of the jeans production so that they will create the production chain by trying to describe what is going on within that process (materials needed, water consumption, country that resides that specific process) through gestures, drawings etc.

All the methods can be adopted for different topics and ages and of course they can be used in synergy.

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Group 4

We started by doing a brainstorm in order to flesh out ideas for our training. We gathered many ideas, some new and some were built on ideas already known. We decided to sift out the strongest ideas for our activities and then develop them into more elaborate methods.
The frame for our training was: a duration of 4 days, 20 participants from the age range of 13-17 years old, 4 trainers needed per activity. For each day we chose a predominating topic.
To apply this training we would chose the participating group from a school, so that we are raising community awareness.

The first day revolved around information acquiring, through the activities of:
-a presentation on the subject of the water footprint and what it stands for;
-a questionnaire for the participants that included questions referring to the preference and frequency of use for jeans;
-a guest speaker from a well known jeans company, that would present the difference between two products they have on the market, one made with typical methods, and one made with special care shown towards the water-footprint.
The second day was based on campaigning experiences in the city, by:
-collecting used jeans items from the local community, by going door to door in the neighbour-hood of the school.
-rally in the city center to raise awareness on jeans production and the possibility to extend jeans’ life cycle
The third day is a workshop day; we will learn how to recycle jeans products through manufacturing new objects that we can sell.
The fourth day is a day for using the information and experience accumulated in the previous days. We will:
– have a fishbowl discussion around the issue of jeans – production cost versus extended life-cycle(focusing on the fact that items made out of jeans are longer lasting), with outside participation from community members
– the participants would learn to act responsibly in order to extend the life cycle of jeans, through using a game application. The game would uses as parameters choices like how often one washes the jeans, what products does he wash them with, what becomes of the product when recycled, etc.

The work process was fruitful and it gave us many leads on how to address the jeans issue in a teaching method. The downside to our approach was that we went on to develop simultaneously many ideas, leading to not fully accomplishing any of them.

Thank you for this learning experience!