thoughtlessly handed out differently coloured sheets of paper, with the result that some cards became easily recognisable. Some pairs managed to make good strategic use of this.
The players of all eight groups greatly enjoyed the game and without excep- tion were very highly committed to winning the game. They yelled out ex- citedly from the first to the last win of a family. The youngest trainee, who played together with the financial representative from the donor, was able to remember the route of the cards and won the most families. She beamed with pride.
9.4 Trainees’ reflections
Reviewing making and playing the game
The trainees now spoke from the perspective of experienced observers. They said that they had detected new talents. One woman recounted how she now knew that she could also draw. Another woman said: ‘I used to work the land and now I’m doing this.’ It came as a surprise to her that she could also be a teacher. One man concluded with delight that the game of Happy Families could be about a range of subjects, including the neglected children that he worked with. A discussion ensued where the trainees asked themselves and each other all sorts of questions, as, for instance, about their behaviour in re- lation to fiancé(e)s, marriage partners and other friends and relatives. It was recalled how the trainees encouraged each other, how full their days were, and how the trainees had worked much more than the trainer.
Staff members remarked during the review meeting that the group struck them as purposeful. They had developed cooperation. One member reck- oned he had learnt more about war victims in the training than he had dur- ing his psychology studies at university. I acknowledged and downplayed his statement: this is about the learning by doing method, which takes shape when the game of Happy Families is made and played. What is learnt cogni- tively over the years at university is turned to practical use during the train- ing.
The trainees were able to answer the follow-up questions from the donor’s delegation members accurately. They explained where the significance of the
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sociotherapy method lay. At the Cordaid delegation’s request, they elaborat- ed on how the exercises can be used in their own socio-economic units, in education and pastoral work, with psychosocial aid and in their own families. Closing the day after the game of Happy Families
The trainees recounted with humour that the mood temperature had risen beyond 100 degrees and with pride that the training method was proving an enriching experience. One woman said that people close to her had noticed that she had started to behave differently. She had allegedly become more open, grumbled less at home and she was more caring towards others. ‘Be- cause of this method I can again think more about things. I’m learning a lot about myself.’
I used these delighted reactions to show that there was more than one way of leading the morning and afternoon assemblies. I asked a trainee what she had learnt that day from the colleague sitting next to her. The trainee’s defensive response was that it was not for her to say something about another person. Another trainee, who had more often shown his willingness to speak up, did give an answer. He used the opportunity to call the group member next to him ‘inspiring’: ‘I’ve learnt that my neighbour is an inspirational man’. One of the trainees confessed that she had thought that the trainer was prejudiced against her. She said that she had meanwhile noticed that this was not so. On occasion, it so happened that there was no time left for a proper after- noon assembly. I would then ask the trainees to sum up that day’s experience in one word. The words used included: ‘good, excellent, pleasurable, emo- tional’.
The morning assemblies following the game of Happy Families
The trainee leading the morning assembly spent some time looking back on the previous afternoon and as she asked a variety of questions she demon- strated that she had internalised the way to learn methodically from experi- ences. The trainees answered her that making the game had proved difficult. Some had had to think long and hard to find a fourth feature for the set ‘fam- ilies’; others had had less or no difficulty. It was admitted that naming sym- bols was not something they did every day, and someone had found it hard to draw a weeping woman. Looking back on how the game was played, one
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