ThenewPE



Using Cognitive Dissonance Activities in Adventure Education

AEE Regional Convention – Radford, VA, March 2012

Presenter: Matthew Cummiskey (mcummiskey@wcupa.edu)

Cognitive dissonance activities are those that create a “storm” of thought in the brain as it focuses on solving the problem at hand. Participants are asked to apply “out of the box” thinking, persistence, and problem solving among many others skills. These outcomes are typically associated with activities that involve physical exertion – spider web for example. However, they may also result from activities that are purely cognitive, yet can teach valuable life lessons. Examples:

1. Keys – Pull a set of keys out of your pocket and move them back and forth between hands. Stop and ask, “Are these keys.” The answer is no. Repeat but this time stop and say, “OK, are these keys.” The answer is yes. If the facilitator inserts a filler word, “um, ya know, like, all right, etc” before the question, they are keys. If not, they are not keys. This activity plays upon people’s tendency to not hear filler words.

2. Goonie – The goonie is a mythical creature who has peculiar likes and dislikes. Guess what types of objects he might like. The goonie only likes objects with double letters: trees but not leaves, walls but not ceilings, yellow but not blue, beer but not soda.

3. Going camping – Participants form a circle, say their name and an object they are bringing camping. The most common form of the game is where the object must begin with the same letter as the person’s last name. More advanced versions 1) object must have the same number of letters as the person’s name and 2) the object must begin with the same letter as ended the person’s name.

4. Uncle Bob - Uncle Bob has an eye problem that you must diagnose. He likes red but not pink, likes boys but not girls, and likes fish but not tuna. To determine Uncle Bob’s problems, participants must guess objects he might/might not like. What is Uncle Boy’s problem? He can’t say words that have an “I.”

5. Thumbs down – The ancient Maya developed a unique numbering system based upon the shape of 3-5 twigs on the ground or etching in the mud. Try and determine the secret of this system. Arrange several short objects (twigs, pens, pencils – whatever is on hand) into a seemingly organized pile. After arranging the pile, the facilitator places neither hand, one hand or both on the ground. Participants guess the number. The correct number has nothing to do with the twigs; it is determined by the number of fingers touching the ground. The only clue is the name of the activity which often participants ignore.

6. Just One Word - Distribute index cards with the letters J U S T O N E W O R D on separate cards. Can create multiple sets of letters using different colors if want to use small groups. Tell participants to form just one word with the letters. They must use all the letters.

7. Number Game – Hold up one finger, this is zero. Hold up two fingers, this is one. Hold up three fingers, this is two. Hold up four fingers, this is three. Hold up five fingers, this is four. Hold up no fingers (fist), this is five. Continue to hold up between 0 and 5 fingers and ask students what number it is. The pattern is that the number is always the previous one shown. For example, if on the tenth time asking the number, three fingers are held up, the answer on the eleventh time is three and so on.

8. Chief – Group sits in a circle. One person leaves the group while they decide who is going to be the chief. When the decision has been made the group begins following the chief, doing whatever s/he is doing: clapping, snapping, making funny faces, etc. The person returns and watches the group to see who the chief is. They get three guesses to determine who the chief is.

9. Observation – Split the group into two teams and have them line up facing each other. One team is “observed” first. They freeze for a set amount of time (ex. 30 seconds) while the other team tries to memorize everything about their frozen picture. After the allotted time, the team that was observing turns their backs while the observed team changes two or three things. For example, Samantha gives her watch to Billy to wear, or Billy zips his previously unzipped sweatshirt. To make the game more playable, it may become necessary to allow only changes in clothing or accessories - not body positioning. After the observed team makes its changes, the other team returns and is allotted a set amount of time and guesses to determine what was changed. After time or number of guesses is expired, swap roles

10. See “Wordles” file on Adventure Ed webpage – allow students three seconds before guessing.

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download