Cooperative Shoe Tie

Purpose: This is activity will promote cooperation and communication skills.

Materials:

1. Shoes with laces

Activity: Have group participants find a partner. The activity begins by having one partner untie one shoe. The objective of this activity is for the partners to retie the shoe each using only one hand to retie the shoe. After completion, switch hands and untie and retie the other person’s shoe.

Variation:

· Use dominant and non-dominant hands

· Ask participants to close their eyes

Processing:

1. What did you observe while participating in this activity?

2. How many of you had trouble with this activity? …Left or right hand? Why do you think this was happening?

3. What does this activity tell you about communication?

4. What strategies did you use to accomplish this activity?

5. How did closing your eyes affect your ability to accomplish this activity?

6. Did you have more trouble when you had to rely on other means of communication? Why or why not?

Activity taken from: MPS Ropes & Challenge Education Curriculum