The A & B Conversation is a communication activity that focuses on healthy communication, conflict resolution, and gaining a different perspective on a situation. This activity can be used in a variety of settings, and today we’re going to focus on facilitating this activity in a workshop setting with adults and young people. This is even better if the participants consist of parents/guardians and their children.
Here’s what you need:
- An even number of participants (for consistency, have the adult be Partner A and the young person be Partner B)
- A timer
- A list of scenarios ranging from conversations perceived to be easy to ones that may be more difficult, including:
- Asking for money to buy an item
- Failing a driver’s test
- Sneaking out past curfew
- Argument over discovery of a social media profile
- Choosing not to go to college
- Meeting with the school principal to discuss allegations of online bullying
- Asking for the meaning of song filled with sexually suggestive lyrics
- Finding condoms in jeans pockets while doing laundry
- Asking if one was a virgin on her/his wedding night
- Disclosing a pregnancy and having questions about terminating the pregnancy
- Disclosing one’s sexuality
- Being caught putting the date rape drug in a person’s drink
The steps:
As the facilitator, choose the scenario the partners will act out. Next, using the timer, have the partners act out the scenario for 2 minutes.
When the timer stops, reset it to 2 minutes, and have the partners switch roles. Have the partners improvise the same scenario, this time with the young person (Partner B) becoming the parent/guardian and the adult (Partner A) becoming the young person.
The follow-up:
After the final 2 minutes is up, have the partners process what took place using the following discussion questions:
- How knowledgable were you about the topic within the scenarios prior to improvising?
- What observations did you make about yourself as both the adult and the young person? Did anything surprise you while you acted in either role?
- In your main role and when you switched roles, do you feel you acted the scenario based on how you would behave ideally or based on what is expected?
- What issues, conflict, or triggers arose during the scenario? Did you have any knee-jerk reactions to your partner’s responses while in either role? If so, how were you able to come to a resolution?
- Identify 1-2 ways to strengthen the communication between you and your partner based on the scenario you acted out.
Creating space to process after an activity like this is important because it will let participants see how knowledgeable they were on a topic, if a topic made them uncomfortable, or if their own personal views on the subject caused them to react in the way they improvised. If a topic made someone uncomfortable, what tools or resources can you offer to help them increase their comfort level?
Choosing an easier scenario to act out first is important as it allows participants to be more comfortable before diving into the meatier topics. You can choose scenarios based around a particular topic. Another idea for this activity is to have participants volunteer acting out the scenario in front of the group and have the participants answer the follow-up questions along with the group. This aids in creating a bigger brainstorm in developing ways to have healthier conflict and allows the rest of the group to quietly sit and observe.
This activity can be a first step on the road to helping young people and adults become more comfortable in discussing variety of topics. Try it out and let me know how it goes.
