Option 3: Cultural Squares

  • Group size: five trainees

Overview of kit: This is a game where trainees must put together the pieces of a puzzle in a cooperative setting. Trainees cannot use verbal cues or familiar body language to do the task.

  • Kit available (with instructions) from the Regina Public Library.
  • You can also purchase the kit from Mission Training International (P.O. Box 1220, Palmer Lake, CO 80133.) More information is available at www.mti.org. under the section entitled "resources." The kit is fairly inexpensive.

Option 4: Dinner in Yekrut

  • Group size: each group can have three or four trainees

Overview of kit: This kit involves participants sharing a meal together. Trainees are to watch each other and figure out what table manners are considered appropriate in the host culture.

  • Kit available (with instructions) from the Regina Public Library.
  • You can also purchase the kit from Mission Training International (P.O. Box 1220, Palmer Lake, CO 80133.) More information is available at www.mti.org. in the section entitled "resources." The kit is fairly inexpensive.

Optional Activity

(Note: These are real examples, based on cultures where Confucianism is a predominant philosophy.)

You may also want to incorporate cross-cultural awareness tasks in each session.

For example:

During one of your coffee breaks, you could request that trainees address each other in a different manner. They can only address people by their first names if they are the same age. People who are older should be referred to as "older sister" or "older brother." Those who are younger than them should be called " younger sister" or "younger brother."

  • Debrief at the end of the class by asking trainees how they felt about having to refer to each other in this manner.
  • Ask trainees how they think immigrants would feel about calling everyone by their first names when they had grown accustomed to referring to each other using a specific designation.
  • An option to consider: Rather than have people reveal their ages, have them write their (fictional) age on a nametag and use that for the activity.