Followership Course Curriculum 1

Followership Course Curriculum 1 Followership Course Curriculum Rachel Clements, Darrin Roberts, Peter Osuna, Elizabeth Fruh, and Chelsea McGhie Azusa Pacific University

Followership Course Curriculum 2 Audience: 6 th Grade students Part 1 Understanding Followership Time: 25 minutes Learning Objectives: Understand definition of followership Practical applications to their life Potential Learning Opportunities: To become a better follower in their everyday life Not giving into peer pressure and listening to their teachers/parents Activity Instructions: Introduction: Inform the students that today they will be learning about Following and what it really means to follow the leader. Ask them to please stay quiet while they watch the Peter Pan clip. Play the Peter Pan clip. You Do: Teacher Modeling After intro, ask them: What are the rules to follow the leader? Does everyone work as a team in the game? (After they answer, explain to them that if one person stops following the leader the rest of the team will be off course. Stress to them that following is very important) Ask them what they would rather do? Follow or lead. Why? (Let them know that every follower has the chance to lead in their own way) Next: Tell them they will be playing the mirror game and you need six volunteers. Explain the rules of the game. All of the students will stand in a straight line facing one

Followership Course Curriculum 3 direction. The person at the end of the line will tap the next student on the back. The student who was tapped will turn around. The leader will do a movement involving two or three different moves for the student they tapped. Then the tapped student will repeat the moves for the next student. Also tapping them on the shoulder so they can turn around. More than likely, the movements will be very different by the time it reaches the end of the line. Have the person at the end of the line to act out the movements and the first person to act out what they did to show the class how different their movements are. Have the students sit down. Tell the students that the game was a great example of how important followers are. Each follower affects the leader. For example, if the last person to act out the movements was the Leader then the whole group of followers influenced what movements the leader would do. Question: When you grow-up, how many of you want to be the best follower you can be? (Hopefully, few if any hands go up) That is no surprise. How many of you want to be the best leader you can be? (Hopefully many hands go up) That is great, but did you know that one could not be leader if you do not have followers? Let look at some examples Good Leader/Follower Woody and Buzz in Toy Story Shrek and fairy tale friends Bad Leader/ Follower Gaston in Beauty and the Beast Stepmother in Cinderella Do you think that any of these leader/character could have accomplished what they did on their own? Transition to example regarding what followership looks like Activity: Simon Says Instructor asks class for a volunteer leader to being the game and explains instructions. The child chosen will tell the class to participate in certain activities when asked by Simon. If the leading child does not say Simon Says and a child acts, that child is out of the game.

Followership Course Curriculum 4 Question: In relation to playing Simon Says, how many of you wanted to be the best follower you can be? Application: This activity represents the importance of following rules and doing as instructed by your parents, teacher, or community leader. Being a follower is good because often times your leader is trying to help you learn or stay safe. An example of this kind of followership would be your teaching giving educational instruction. There is a common purpose of education between teacher and student, which allows for a successful leader/follower relationship. On the other hand, all followers have one universal goal that makes them equal. What enriches the educational experience is the contribution that each of you makes. It is up to you together as a team to teach one another and push the class forward. Wrap-up and Reflection Think about ways that you can assist you teacher in teaching the class and helping other students Part 2 Sensemaking: A Crime Scene Investigation Time: 15 minutes Learning Objectives: To have a complete understanding of what sensemaking is To understand why sensemaking is important for followers Materials: Sensemaking Handout (Handout A) Instructions for Sensemaking Activity: Students will watch a 30 second YouTube clip of a car high jacking Students will be instructed to pay attention to as many details as possible

Followership Course Curriculum 5 After video clip is over, students will be instructed to write down as many details as possible, there will be prompts displayed on the PowerPoint slide: How many people were involved? Describe the car involved. What were the criminals wearing? Describe the victim. Did the criminals use a weapon what kind of weapon? How long do you think the crime took? Where were the criminals going? Students are asked to share the details they observed with the class Students will be given a handout that reiterates what sensemaking is and why it is important for followers Purpose: The purpose of the activity is to demonstrate that an individual s experience of an event is different for each person. Each student will notice different details and some details may be incorrect. The difference in each individual s experience of the car high jacking will illustrate what sensemaking is. Part 3 Courageous Follower Time: 10 minutes Learning Objective: Identify and practice the five attributes of courageous followers Materials Needed: Enough blindfolds and buzzers for every third student in the classroom Courageous Follower Handout (Handout B)

Followership Course Curriculum 6 Preparation: Use Masking tape to mark out a map on the floor, enough for 2 minutes of walking, as directed by another student (indoors or outside, to increase obstacles). Opening: Raise your hand if you want to be a leader. Now, raise your hand if you want to be a follower. Most people think being a leader is a lot more important than being a follower. However, being a good follower is just as important as being a good leader. Lets see how you guys are at following. Activity: Count off each student so that they are in random groups of three. Provide each trio with one blindfold. Have Student 1 verbally direct Student 2 (blindfolded) through maze. No physically directing allowed. Responsibility of Student 3 is to sound buzzer each time Student 2 (blindfolded) steps off map. At the end of the maze or after 2 minutes, teacher alert each trio to change positions so that Students transfer positions. After 6 minutes of activity, or each student has alternated in each position, call students back to classroom. Applications: Ask students about their experiences in the position as follower while blindfolded. Focus on the challenges of trust in leader as well as remaining alert for the areas where they struggled. Ask students about experiences in leadership positions, attempting to direct other student. Focus on frustrations when follower had difficulty transforming to leader s directions as well as assuming responsibility for themselves and directing the follower.

Followership Course Curriculum 7 Ask students about their experiences in the position of buzzer or group leader. Focus on difficulties of letting followers be individuals and use their own personal strengths in project, as well as focusing on keeping the leader in line with overall purpose to reach end up obstacle course. Go through handout with students in open discussion and ask students for examples of each attribute of courageous leadership and their current positions of followers or leaders in various groups and settings. Part 4 The Milgram s Experiment Time: 10 minutes Learning Objectives: The students should learn about Milgram s experiments on obedience and understand how leaders can manipulate settings to create an alternate reality. Based on the story, students should critically examine their own settings. Milgram s Story: There was once a young man named Stanley Milgram. Stanley went to work for a very famous college, called Yale. While Stanley was at Yale, he came up with this idea to do some experiments. These experiments were trying to figure out how obedient people were to people in lab coats. What the people in the experiments did not know was that Stanley had tricked them. The people in the experiments were told that they were going to help teach other people some new word pairs, and when they got the answers wrong, they would give them a little shock, like putting a battery on your tongue. What Stanley did not tell them was that they were not actually shocking anyone else and there were just actors pretending to be shocked. You see, Stanley was interested in finding out what people are willing to do to other people if someone in a lab coat tells them to do it. The

Followership Course Curriculum 8 actors would yell and scream as though they were being shocked really badly, but the people in the experiment would still keep shocking them. The shocks would get even bigger, but even still the people would continue to keep shocking the actors no matter how much they screamed and yelled in pain. Stanley s experiment was a big deal and there were many people that did not like that he had showed just how bad normal people could be. However, Stanley knew that it was important to show people how bad some people were willing to be if someone important told them to do it. What Stanley had figured out with his experiment was that normal people were willing to do bad things if the people in charge told them it was okay. The people in the lab coats had created a whole new reality that the people in the experiment were living and participating in. Stanley used what he learned to tell people about how dangerous it can be for people to trust the leaders around them without ever questioning how bad the things they were asked to do. Stanley did not want people to just not trust their leaders, but he wanted them to understand that they always have a choice and need to decide for themselves what it right and what is wrong. Questions: What did Stanley do to trick the people in the experiment? What did Stanley learn from his experiment? What did Stanley want people to learn from the results of his experiment? Handout A Sensemaking A Crime Scene Investigation

Followership Course Curriculum 9 What is Sensemaking? When an event occurs, like a crime scene, each person that witnesses the event experiences the event differently. The event is the same but the experience is different for each witness. One person might remember a green shirt, while another person might remember a blue shirt. The conclusions that we come to about an event are often quick. Why is Sensemaking important for followers? Followers need to be able to make sense of an event without the guidance of their leader. This allows followers to adapt to change in their environment before their leader, who might be more isolated from the environment than their followers are. In other words, when an earthquake occurs in your classroom, will you stand and wait for instructions from your teacher, while everything around you is crashing down, or will you take action on your own? Handout B Courageous Follower Handout

Followership Course Curriculum 10 Courageous followers Assume responsibility Assume responsibility for themselves and their decisions Discover or create opportunities to fulfill their potential and maximize their value to their group i.e. school, group project, youth group, band, etc. Serve Are not afraid of the hard work required to serve a leader They stay alert for areas in which their strengths and assert themselves in these areas Challenge Give voice to the discomfort they feel when the behaviors or rules of the leader or group are in conflict with their sense of what is right Willing to stand up, stand out, risk rejection and initiate conflict in order to examine the actions of the leader and group when appropriate Work hard to keep the leader consistent in word, creates mutual trust with leader Participate in Transformation Examine their own need for transformation and become full participants in the change process as appropriate Put themselves on the line Take Moral Action Know when it is time to separate a leader from the group Sometimes the follower or group may no longer match up, this may require a follower to leave