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Recall your body parts

we often forget things that we are very familiar with, don't we?

How many parts of the body can you name, in polite company, using three letter words?

Learning Point

When under pressure it is often difficult to recall things that we know quite well.

Duration

Activity takes about ten minutes, debrief can be expanded over whole of session

Materials required

Handout Memory Activity Handout

Make enough copies for each participant, and also enough for an extra copy for each team of four to six participants

Procedure

1.Ask participants to write down as many body parts that are three letter words as they can remember. Keep it to words that can be used in polite company.

2.Explain that this is an individual exercise, instructions for a team activity will follow.

Allow two to three minutes. Stop the individual activity when it appears that most have gone as far they can

3.Assign participants to groups of 3 or 4

4.Ask the groups to see who can come up with the longest list.

Allow three minutes

5.Ask for words from the class and build up a list on a flip chart.

6.After gathering the whole of group list, display a full list

Solution

Partial list of three letter body parts

Ear, Eye, Lip, Jaw, Rib, Hip, Arm , Leg, Toe, Lap, Gut, Gum, Fat (is it a body part?).

Thanks to Lida Bishop for these additional ones:

lid (eye)
pad (thumb)
pit (arm)
lap (thighs)
ren (kidney)
rim (eye)
sac (dental, urethral, and all sorts of others)
cap (skull, knee)

Debrief

Ask: What can we learn from this activity?

This activity demonstrates:

The importance of preparation and planning. Under pressure we may not recall things that we know well
The value of teamwork. Others may recall information that we cannot
Different interpretations. A word used in polite company may mean different things to different people
Influenced by irrelevant factors. Many people stop listing when they fill the eight lines. Others see the form as a request for 24 words.

Summary

Improving recall requires:

Planning Decide what to do before you need to do it.

Preparation Tools, forms, procedures available where you will be able to find them when the pressure come on.

Practice Rehearsal. Experiential training provides an opportunity to do this in a low risk environment.

Prompts For example:Emergency buttons are always RED,

John Sleigh has been applying adult learning principles to training design and workplace communication projects since 1988.

These resources are provided for your personal use. For permission to include them in your published materials, contact John. Permission is usually given for fair use, but please ask first. I like to receive feedback on how you think the materials can be used to stimulate ideas for further development.

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