Happy photo

Objectives

• putting participants in touch with a happy feeling by means of a photo
• encourage participants (in an approachable way) to tell a short story
• familiarise participants with the fact that when someone tells a story to a group of people, each listener interprets what they hear in a different way.
• making participants aware that the narrator and the listener both have an active role
• foster acquaintance between participants
• give you as a trainer some insight into the storytelling skills of the participants

Preparation

Needed: participants need a device on which they can choose their own photo (mobile phone, laptop, etc.)

Instructions

• Ask the participants to choose a picture that makes them happy on a mobile device (usually this will be a phone). Give them 5 minutes to do this.
• Ask them not to show that photo to others
• Ask one of the participants to tell the group about the photo (for example: where was it taken and when, who were you with, why does the photo make you happy)
• When the participant has finished his/her story, ask another participant to describe the photo as he/she thinks it looks based on what has been said about it
• Then ask the first participant to show the photo to the group
• Repeat until everyone has told their story about their photo and everyone has described what they think the photo looks like based on that story.

Then ask the participants what the differences are between what you think the photo looks like and what it actually is. Give them time to come up with their own answer (along the lines of: the story about the photo evokes images in me). Once the answer has been given, you can build a bridge to how everyone can give their own interpretation to a story told which implies that not only the narrator, but also the listener plays an active role in how a story is ‘received’.

Variant

• If the group consists of more than 8 people, you can choose to split the group into pairs. One person starts by telling the others about the photo, one listener then describes what he/she thinks the photo looks like after which the roles are reversed. Once everyone has done this, bring the group back together and ask the question what causes the differences.
• Instead of asking people to choose a photo from their own archives, you can make them choose between photos you provide. (This is also a solution if people refuse to use one of their own photos for this activity.) If you choose to do it this way, instead of asking them to talk about the situation that made them happy, you can ask them to make up a story, inspired by what they see in the picture. For some people this might be easier than talking about something personal linked to their own photo. For others it might be harder. You could also combine both activities and ask some to use their own picture and others to have a look at yours.
• To link this activity more to civic integration and still use it to open people up to talking and listening you could give the learners a word (i.e. police, hospital, city council, family, public transport) that they need to search for in Google images. Which image do they choose? What story do they share about this? In what way are interpretations different or similar?