Chapter 21: Do Well and Succeed Game

This game demonstrates how the way one is treated really affects how one feels.  It can stop you or keep you going.

Tell your group that everyone will get a chance to play this game.

Get a volunteer and have them go to one side of the room.

Have all the other kids make two lines facing one another, not too far apart but wide enough apart so that the person on the side of the room can walk comfortably down the row. Tell them they are going to walking down an aisle of their peers and they are to simply keep going along but to feel free to notice and be affected by what happens.

There is no touching in this game.

What the two rows will do once the person starts walking is give off various “attitudes.”

You, as the group leader, want to whisper to them what they will be doing so the person about to walk is surprised a bit by the attitude and has to deal with it.

As he walks along:

• They might turn and whisper about that person
• Stare at him/her with anger
• Congratulate him
• Stare at him in awe and admiration
• Boo at them
• Yell at them
• Smile lovingly
• Cheer for them.

There are many different attitudes.  You can really get at the kinds of peer pressure games that exist in school.

Always end with the lines cheering for them.

Don’t spend a lot of time talking about the exercise, just do it a lot and after one kid is done, run another one down the line.

When everyone is through talk to them about what they have learned and relate it to the Do Well and Succeed chapter.  Essentially, what you’re getting at is that the way one is treated can change the way you persist on a given course and that if you find yourself surrounded by the wrong attitude it can hurt you.

It can also enlighten kids that are “being mean” and getting into cliques that they are doing so.