Bonding: Faith, Courage, and Humility

We are now into our second week for project! The first week all of our activities focused on bonding with one another, as well as, the virtues faith, courage, and humility. Students learned practical ways to apply these virtues through rock climbing, boldering, rapelling, and traversing.

The rock climbing program focused on bonding with one another. Before they began, everyone was given a card with various instructions. Most of the cards said "The goal of today is to bond with one another. Talk to as many people as you can, ask open ended questions, participate, and be encouraging." However, four of the students were given "handicap" cards, each with a different stipulation. They were each told one of the following: to not to talk unless someone asked you a question, to always turn the conversation into talking about yourself, to only answer questions with a yes or no, and to only ask others questions, but never answer any about yourself. Also, you were not allowed to tell others about your handicap. This is where the program of bonding came into play! During the debrief the four students revealed that they were "role playing" and talked about how it affected them, the others, and the group. Matt, a student from L.A., was only allowed to answer questions with a "yes" or "no". He said that it was frustrating to not be able to elaborte more and it really affected his bonding. "Eventually, people just stopped talking to me and I felt really isolated" he said. Matt really learned the important of open-ended questions and how you're effected when you don't bond with people. All of the students have various stories of what they learned from the program.