The street at night [starter activity]

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This activity is about bringing out how we practise assessing risks in order to live and survive. In this activity, a dark street at night will be shown to the participants so that they answer the question, “What would you do in order to navigate this street alone safely?”

The exercise is meant to bring out ways that we automatically assess threats and mitigate them in this specific situation.

Learning objectives

By the end of this activity, the participants will:

Who is this activity for?

This activity can be done with participants who have no experience with risk assessment as well as those who have done risk assessments in the past.

Facilitator’s note: It is important for the trainer-facilitator to be familiar with the group, as this activity might activate past trauma about navigating streets at night among some participants.

Time required

45 minutes

Resources

Mechanics

Introduce the exercise by showing a picture of a street at night. It is also good to remind the participants that there are no right or wrong answers.

There are some examples provided here, but you can also take your own picture that will fit into your context.

station_at_night.jpg

Photo: Yuma Yanagisawa, Small Station at night, on Flickr.

street_at_night.jpg

Photo: Andy Worthington, Deptford High Street at night, on Flickr

Give the participants time to reflect on answering the question: “How would you navigate this street alone at night?”

Intersectional note: You do not want to assume that everyone has the same physical capacities and abilities. This is why we are using navigate instead of walk.

Ask them to write down their responses for themselves .

This should take no more than five minutes. You do not want the participants to over-think their answers.

Then spend some time getting the participants to answer the question one at a time. At this point, as a facilitator-trainer, you are just writing down the participants’ answers on the board or the flip chart paper as they speak them out.

Once you see some trends in their responses – common responses as well as responses that are unique – begin asking the participants for the reason why they responded that way.

At this stage, we are somewhat reverse-engineering the process. We started with the how’s, now we are getting to the why’s. Here, we are looking for the threats – the causes of danger – that they have assumed in their answers to the how’s.

Note down the threats as well.

It is also a good idea to look at the photo again to see elements in it that could pose a threat, or that could be seen as opportunities to allow a person alone to navigate it more safely.

For example, in the first photo:

In the second photo:

If you are planning to do your own night-time street photo, consider having the following elements in it:

After spending a bit of time on the why’s of the safety tactics and the threats, ask the participants the question: “What other things do you need to know about this street in order to make better decisions about how to navigate it safely?”

Allow them time to reflect on their responses.

Then gather their responses, and write them down on the board.

Synthesise the session. Highlight some key points:

Facilitator’s notes

day_market.jpg

Photo: Carl Campbell, El Chopo Saturday Market crowds, on Flickr.

night_market.jpg

Photo: Waychen C, Shilin Night Market, on Flickr.


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Revision #3
Created 18 April 2023 03:11:56 by Kira
Updated 27 June 2023 13:35:14 by Kira