{"id":4962,"date":"2016-09-30T05:56:18","date_gmt":"2016-09-30T05:56:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/teachformalaysia.org\/the-lesson-of-the-fortunate-and-the-handicapped\/"},"modified":"2016-09-30T05:56:18","modified_gmt":"2016-09-30T05:56:18","slug":"the-lesson-of-the-fortunate-and-the-handicapped","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/teachformalaysia.org\/my\/the-lesson-of-the-fortunate-and-the-handicapped\/","title":{"rendered":"The Lesson of the Fortunate and the Handicapped"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Raee Yeoh, 2015 Fellow<\/p>\n

The film \u2018Train to Busan\u2019 inspired me to conduct this activity, and it\u00a0was also 2014 Alumnus,\u00a0Anders Cheng\u2019s idea for the English camp in our school.<\/em><\/p>\n

In today\u2019s Civic Education (Pendidikan Sivik<\/em>) class, I brought 35 students to our school\u00a0hall for a physically-challenging activity.<\/p>\n

*** The Rules ***<\/strong>
\n1. The concept is the same as the game \u2018The Floor is Lava<\/a>\u2018 \u2013 no feet can touch the ground at all.<\/p>\n

2. The class is split into 6 teams, each team has 5 members. Girls teams get\u00a04 chairs while boys teams get\u00a03. Students have to cross 50 meters\u00a0of\u00a0\u2018hot lava\u2019 to reach their destination.<\/p>\n

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3. Whoever falls into the \u2018lava\u2019 will be dragged 3 meters away from the team, and the team has to make a detour to save their fallen comrade.<\/p>\n

4. I placed some \u2018free\u2019 chairs in the middle of the \u2018lava\u2019 which\u00a0any team may\u00a0take. The fastest team may\u00a0grab as many as they want.<\/p>\n

5. Lastly, the objective of the activity is emphasised: First, everyone has to survive. Second, you have 8 minutes to reach your\u00a0destination.<\/p>\n

***<\/strong>
\nEveryone was very competitive and tried their best to win the race in 8 minutes.\u00a0The\u00a0following\u00a0are the outcomes and the debrief we had after the race:<\/p>\n

#1:\u00a0Boys Team A (Finished in 4:19)<\/p>\n

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\nEven though they were handicapped (had only 3 chairs); they were physically fit and\u00a0moved quickly, and was\u00a0the first team to reach the destination.<\/p>\n

Debrief: Even with disadvantages, some people turn out to be dark horses. They might have started off lacking resources, but because of the\u00a0effort they put in, they achieve their goals faster than others. Also, their\u00a0journey of survival isn\u2019t necessarily easy, despite being\u00a0the fastest.<\/p>\n

*
\n#2 Girls Team D (3 members finished in 7:55, with 2 members left behind)<\/p>\n

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They weren\u2019t agile enough to move among their friends while balancing on the chairs, thus some of their comrades fell into the \u2018lava\u2019. Their comrades were dragged 3 meters away and they were already exhausted. In\u00a0the end, they decided to leave\u00a0their fallen comrades\u00a0because \u201cit was faster without them\u201d.<\/p>\n

Debrief: 2 members had to be sacrificed in order to fulfill the team\u2019s goal. It was human nature to leave their \u2018burden\u2019 behind to reach their goal in the short time frame.<\/p>\n

*
\n#3 Boys Team F (Unfinished)<\/p>\n

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This group of boys started slowly and kept falling into the \u2018lava\u2019 as a team. They were\u00a0suspended for 1 minute as a\u00a0consequence of drowning in the \u2018lava\u2019. They were demotivated as the \u2018free\u2019 chairs were grabbed by all the\u00a0other groups, and Team C needed more than 10 minutes to reach the destination anyways. At the end of 8 minutes, they only managed to complete 40% of their journey.<\/p>\n

Debrief: Life won\u2019t treat you fair and square, the hierarchy of social status is never fair. Whining over\u00a0the inequity won\u2019t and can never change anything. If you are expecting other teams to help you achieve\u00a0your\u00a0goal, chances are none of them will help\u00a0you as they were fighting hard for their own survival.<\/p>\n

***<\/strong>
\n\u201cWell, so now what do you think? Who is the winner of today\u2019s activity?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTeams A, B and\u00a0C,\u00a0Cikgu<\/em>. Yeah, we know that cooperation is the key to success.\u201d They genuinely thought they were learning Darwin\u2019s theory of\u00a0survival of the fittest for this activity.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo any of you remember the objective I emphasised earlier? Everyone has to survive. EVERYONE HAS TO SURVIVE. Now tell me again, did any of you achieve our objective? Did any of you win it all?\u201d<\/p>\n

Dead silence. Team A was no longer proud.<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have another 10 minutes before our class ends. Wanna give yourselves a second chance?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYEAHHHH!\u201d<\/p>\n

***<\/strong>
\nAll of them decided to travel together and move in a long 30-person line.\u00a0It wasn\u2019t easy but everybody was so united in achieving the goal.<\/p>\n

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This is a Form 1 class, and gender segregation is still happening at\u00a0their age, boys and girls just don\u2019t like each other; but this was the very first time I witnessed the whole class cheering and voluntarily helping each other\u00a0\u2013\u00a0watch the video!<\/p>\n