This training camp is designed by the Italian National Agency for the volunteers in Italy. The purpose of the training camp is not only establishing a friendship among the volunteers but also informing volunteers about the details of the volunteer programs such as the responsibility and duties of volunteers/host organizations/sending organizations.
Arrival Day: The point of arrival day is to get familiar with every volunteer and try to create a safe and comfortable environment for all the participants. After the arrival of the participants, the trainers made a quick summary of the program to inform volunteers about what to expect from the next couple of days.
Then introduced some board games to play during the evening for creating a bond among participants.
1st Day of Training: The first day is relatively more comfortable than the next training days due to the low intensity of it. Basically, the first day is welcoming the group, and trying to know everyone closer. Getting to know each other is a key element both for the productivity and efficiency of the training and for establishing a common goal. By knowing each other, volunteers can realize that even though they are different from each other in case of their backgrounds, home countries, nationalities, characters, they are all volunteers and encounter similar experiences during their volunteer journey in Italy.
The Activity of The Day: CREATING A PAGE FOR YOURSELF
- Everybody should create a page on a given platform to represent themselves to the others.
- People can upload pictures, videos, texts, gifs etc.
- The point is to make everyone visible.
2nd Day of Training: The second day started with a game called speed dating. It is a game designed to make people get in contact and talk about different topics. Everybody draws a clock on a piece of paper, then everybody should find a person to date for every hour on the clock. The trainer chooses a specific time and subject to talk. Everybody meets with their date and talks about the chosen subject. Subjects can vary from your favorite meals to your future plans after the volunteering program.
After getting to know people individually, trainers give another game for team-building.
Trainers separated the volunteers into 5 different teams and gave 50 pieces of puzzles to each team. The problem is every puzzle has some missing pieces that you can only find by communicating with the other teams. Therefore, even though it seems like a competition of 5 different teams, all the volunteers are part of one team that should work together to complete the given task by the volunteers.
For the next part of the day, trainers put lots of colorful papers, markers, scissors, glues and a variety of magazines. Then, everybody started to create their own ESC Experience with the existing materials and by using their creativity. At the end of the preparation, everybody explained his/her experience in different groups for 15 minutes.
Finally, before closing the day, our main topic was “solidarity”. First, trainers shared a link with more than a 100 quotes about solidarity and gave us some time for reading and choosing our favorites among them.
Then we formed groups of two people and discussed our favorite quotes. After the group session every group shared their favorites with all.
3rd Day of Training: Main focus of the 3rd day is about “Youth Competences” and “Intercultural Learning.” After getting informed about these topics, we studied “Conflict Management.” First, trainers started talking about the importance of communication and giving some tips for better and more efficient communication in the case of conflict. Then, trainees separated 6 different groups to study different cases of conflicts from the real cases from the past. After studying for 15 minutes, every group animates their own case with a solution in front of others.
4th Day of Training: 4th day of training is started by talking about the importance of giving feedback under the title of “The Art of Giving Feedback”. Improvement in our volunteer projects is only possible by the effort of both volunteer and host organizations. To solve a problem or unwanted condition in our projects, the way we communicate and give feedback to each other is very crucial.
After learning more about “The Art of Giving Feedback”, everybody shared their ideas and gave imaginary feedback to their host organizations by using what they learned from the trainers.
For the rest of the day, all the trainees were free to visit Rome and enjoy the city.
5th Day of Training: 5th day is the last day of training camp. The focus of the last day was about the evaluation of the training week and what we learned from the training.
Trainers presented a coaching model which is called “GROW”. The model is a tool to use during and after our volunteer projects. Basically, the model says deciding your goals according to the reality that you lived in is important to become successful and reach those goals. After, it is time to observe your options to reach those goals. The model suggests setting your actions for the future after these steps.
