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Group Size: Any
Time Needed: 15 to 20 minutes
Goal: To build group cohesion by sharing common hopes and dreams in relation to children or marriage and help participants focus on what they really want in the long term
Audience: Couples, Parents, Teens
Special Considerations: This completed exercise can be referred to frequently throughout the duration of your workshop. Be non-judgmental as people express their long term hopes for their children or partners.
Resources Needed:

Step-by-Step Instructions

  1. Tell participants to trace one of their hands on to the construction paper and cut it out.
  2. Ask them to think of their partner or their children.
  3. Instruct them to write the name (or names) they are thinking of on the palm of the hand.
  4. Ask them to set down the hands and close their eyes. Tell them to visualize who they wrote on the hand 10 or 20 years from now. Do you want them to be happy, to be good citizens, to be generous and kind? What do their belief and value systems look like? What else do the participants want for whom they visualized?
  5. Have them open their eyes and write one hope on each finger of the hand.
  6. Next, the participants will come up one at a time and tape the hand to the class poster board, while at the same time sharing their hope with the class. Participants will find that they have many hopes in common with other members of the group.

Tips for Discussion and Processing

This poster can be hung up each week before class. As class discussions stall around how to handle a specific situation or problem, the facilitator can point back to the poster and ask participants which solutions will help them make their hopes a reality. The activity can also show that, whatever our culture or background, we all generally want the same things for our children and partners.

Note: These activities can be modified to reflect a variety of skills.