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My facilitation Workshop for teenager's in Care.

I really enjoyed facilitating my workshop in which we completed two funny icebreaker games and then some life-story work with the primary aim of developing a sense of belonging and identity for teenagers in the care system. Facilitating this workshop made me feel nervous and apprehensive at the start however, once I had all the prep work done and practised a few times, my nerves were eased. I tend to get quite anxious speaking to large groups of people so I knew this workshop would be a challenge. However, once I had began the workshop, I found myself easing into it and slowly being able to breathe my way through. As I spoke, I found myself excited to continue and even felt an urge to participate in the games with the group! I was so proud of myself when we had finished, I felt such a sense of pride and relief bundled up in one. From this experience, I have learned that perhaps my biggest challenges with regard to facilitating is my nerves and my urge to over plan! I have perfectionist tendencies and I don't tend to do well when I don't know what to expect. This is definitely something I wish to work on due to the unpredictability of Social Care and group facilitations. I also learned that despite all the planning and prep you may do, sometimes you can show up to a group on a day with a certain agenda and forget the main reason your there is to work with the group and not for the group as we have learned through a partnership approach. My strengths in facilitating this workshop I believe were having the ability to get involved with my group and speak to people individually to get a sense of the wider group dynamic. Overall, I have a great sense of achievement and pride having facilitated my workshop and I look forward to doing more in the future!

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For my second reflection, I am going to reflect on the class I participated in where we took part in many games with the primary aim of raising our 'Feel Good' hormones. In a class previous to this one, we watched a very educating video on the purpose of exercise and play in raising these hormones namely 1. Endorphins, 2.Oxytocin, 3.Dopamine and 4.Serotonin. I really enjoyed watching this video as it was personal to me, the man in the video spoke about people going to the gym with the primary focus of getting fit and moving and compared such to people who get their exercise and movement through fun and games and being in nature and spoke how how research shows people who exercise for their mental health rather than their physical health tend to be much happier. This struck a cord for me as I noticed I had become fixated with going to the gym to get a 'perfect body' and forgot that I should be going to raise my happiness, not anyone else's. Following on from this class, we took part in many games proven to raise our serotonin levels and I must say, this we did! At the beginning of the class, majority of the class expressed feelings of tiredness and stress (understandably as we have hit the busiest point in the semester!). We then played some games, one in particular which I loved was the game that involved us working in teams of 5 to complete a race essentially using our bodies and making all sorts of funky & cool shapes. I thought this was thrilling and really brought out our competitive nature. By the end of the activity, everyone had noticed we were panting for breath and there was a lovely sense of giggling and joyfulness in the room, in comparison to when we first began class. When I was asked how I was feeling at the end of the class, I noticed my mood truly had changed, I wasn't as tired or sluggish but rather fulfilled and gleeful!

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For my third reflection, I am going to reflect upon one of our more artistic class where we used some extra creativity! In the class I am referring to, we set out to learn about the different sensations we can feel with our hands. We worked in groups and rummaged through newspapers to find words that meant something to us collectively. We chose the word "Unity" and what better word to sum up this activity. To begin, we traced out stencils of our hands. Then we had to write down all the things we can do with our hands e.g. high-five, wave, pinch etc. This would help our service users with fine motor skills aswell as hand-eye coordination. We then wrote as many of these words as we could fit onto our hands. This was more difficult than you would imagine and really tickled my brain at 9am! We worked together creatively to complete this activity and we created beautiful posters of our group holding hands in unity which was our original theme. While I did enjoy this activity, I didn't enjoy it as much as some of our other classes as I would not usually be drawn to art as much as I would dance or music, however it was another experience for me to explore art in a judgement free environment with no pressure. I was lucky in this activity as my friend whom I was paired with is extremely artistic and she was able to help me to be creative and motivated me to at least give it a try. Here is our masterpiece we created!

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I am going to reflect on the trailer of a documentary called 'Alive Inside' which looks at a social worker’s idea that music has a tremendous ability to help people suffering from Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia. On a hunch, this America Social Worker brought iPods to a nursing home to play for patients who suffered memory loss. To his surprise, unresponsive patients became more engaged and communicative when they listened to the music of their youth. I absolutely adore this idea as music therapy holds a special place in my heart. I truly believe that music is the most amazing way for one to express their feelings and feel listened to and understood. Music in Social Care is such a gift as we can use it to connect with people of all sorts. Sometimes people (myself included) can find it extremely difficult to put their feelings into words, leaving you feeling isolated and alone, however, it is so simple now to simply look up a song or turn on your radio and know that someone else out in the world hears and understands the pain your going through. This simple realisation can make a person feel so much better. This depiction is showed perfectly in this documentary. People suffering from Dementia or the sorts have tremendous difficulties remembering who they were as person in the past. I cant imagine how hard this must be, too lose an aspect of your personality or too forget who you are. However, this documentary shows the true power of music to bring you back to a certain period of your life or to bring back certain feelings you have had following pivotal events in one's life. This documentary focuses on the 'heart and soul' of the person, rather than their medical needs which many social care workers' believe is an issue when it comes to caring for those with Alzheimer's or dementia. It is essentially a story of music and memory. This documentary really hit me on a personal level as I work with a lady who is diagnosed with dementia and I am always seeking new ways of interacting and engaging with her at a meaningful level. It is my belief that social care workers often find it quite difficult working with service users diagnosed with dementia due to the unpredictability of its nature and often times the diagnosis comes with challenging behaviours. These behaviour's can often make it difficult a social care worker to really connect with the service user on this meaningful level. However, they have found ways in doing so through the use of music therapy which i personally find astonishing.