2011 Young RYLA
Debrief Information from Heather Amen
Registration – Awesome! Needs to move a little faster with handing out nametags and binders so there is not such a long line. Maybe another way to do all the stuff the nurse needs too?
Brainwise – Absolutely wonderful this year, keep it up!
Word of Focus – all absolutely amazing, I’m very impressed with the structure, the words, and the presentations of every single JC.
True Colors – maybe look at a new presenter? I love John, but the kids lose interest when he is reading lists off powerpoint. The skit with the JCs was good, but could have been fleshed out a bit better. My team loved having the wheel to show everyone their colors, and the little stickers for nametags were great too!
Towers – I love splitting the teams in half for marshmallows, and doing it as part of a three-part matrix was great and much less noisy. So fun!
My Life List – great, loved it! Dave Boon did a nice job pulling all the great, important information out for this year’s presentation.
Swept away – went great, especially going after Dave.
Twilight Time – I liked having it right after dinner on the nights we did, rather than late when they were exhausted. We had much better interaction and discussion.
Corey – great, but my kids got lost in his multiple messages. They all thought he did a wonderful job, but were very confused as to his point.
Matrix – awesome! Almost every activity was wonderful. The hardest one (which still wasn’t bad, just wasn’t as great as the others) was the four-way test. Our Rotarian (Tuesday right before lunch) was very dry and did not seem to tie in the four way test to the scenarios. My kids still liked it and enjoyed it, but felt that he was boring!
Movie – I loved the blind side, as did the kids. Great choice!
Walk of possibilities – VERY fun! Jim did a wonderful job stepping in, and the kids really got the point and had a blast.
Global Stations – interesting and well done. I love the idea of doing the games as well as information, it kept everyone interested. The students said it was too loud in there to hear all the presentations, and they were interested! They also felt the time at each station was short.
Hike – awesome!
Take a look around – done EXTREMELY well! The music selection was brilliant, as was twilight time after. However, my kids were bonkers after the first hour and a half of twilight time. Maybe we could have an hour or hour and a half right after take a look around, and then a fun activity together that evening before bed?
Youth for Biodiversity – my kids really enjoyed Wally, and thought he was great. They totally understood his point of turning passion into action, and were excited to do it themselves.
Comedy Club – funny! The stars were great too, my kids had a wonderful time with both.
Rotary youth programs – I really like the rotating. The kids were a bit tired because it was right after lunch, but they enjoyed the info we gave on shelterbox, and it was really cool to be able to walk through it!
Goofy Olympics – I liked all the games! Jump rope was hard for some of my kids that have a really difficult time with failure, and one girl was very upset and discouraged because “she really just couldn’t do it and kept messing it up for everyone else”.
Call to Action – Good discussion with the kids, but we had to make it active. We acted out who was oil versus solar energy (our topic was renewable energy) and I gave them challenging choices to act out. That made them more interested, but it was hard when it came to action time. Their creative brains wanted our group to replace gas worldwide with corn oil, or something so huge. That’s amazing and great, but does not leave them with a lot that they can do in their local community to make a difference.
Dance – Fantastic!
Friday – totally wonderful. I liked having the last team time, though it was very short. By the time we gathered everyone from Circle of Friends, we really only had 15 minutes, and no lighter. Maybe we could extend that time, or at least get everyone out of Circle of Friends sooner?
Clean up – Seemed to go well, could have used more specific assignments and plans.