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Daniel McDonagh
HDF413
Alison Jackson Fraiser
Co-Facilitation experience
This was my first lead facilitation where I had taken charge of planning the retreat,
getting in contact with the groups president and filling out all the necessary paperwork. The
group was fantastic and worked so well with each other that the other facilitators and I had a
difficult time trying to figure out who was on the e-board for the group. The groups dynamic
made it easy for the other facilitators and me to work with them and run each activity smoothly.
Some of my staff were newer members who hadnt been on a retreat before, so I feel a little sorry
that they may never see a group that worked so well and had such a positive attitude as this one.
The group I had the pleasure of leading was Musically Inclined, an acapella group here
on campus, they wanted a retreat to help bring the group together by creating new friendships
with new members and strengthening any old friendships. They didnt want anything high
conflict that would get them to storm with each other so we decided to keep activities on the
easier side.
With a team of people who were doing things mostly for the first time, myself leading for
the first time, Natascha facilitating for the first time, and Maddie shadowing for the first time I
wanted everyone to be slightly comfortable but I also wanted to try to push them outside of their
comfort zone. Maddie ran an initiative, human knot, occasionally asking for advice during the
activity but I let her give the final say when making decisions on the activity. After taking about
20 minutes the group finally finished the human knot and you could see how happy the group
was and how accomplished they felt. Between activities and during breaks I played music which

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the group responded well to, often singing along with what I was playing, Lucinda even said to
me after We all loved that you played Bohemian Rhapsody during our retreat that was great.
Our timing for most things was great, we finished big booty a little earlier than expected so we
decided to add some more energizers like honey do you love me. I think a lot of the activities we
did with the group allowed them to bond with each other without there being that high of a stress
level.
When lunch finally arrived we had just finished up with blanket volleyball and we all
jumped at the food, but we almost forgot to debrief blanket volleyball. Though the retreat didnt
need high stress activities, we still wanted to debrief the activity to get them thinking about how
well they all worked together in that situation. Though we should have done it prior to lunch we
waited until everyone was done eating to debrief. Part of me thinks that human knot went over
fine, while part of me wishes that we use the rope and did knot my problem instead, because
there was moments were people were complaining of being pulled in one direction and twisted in
weird ways. The time the group also took was a long time so it was getting to the point where we
were thinking about stopping the activity to just debrief. Ultimately I would have liked to do
another activity other than human knot, but because of the newer team I had, we tried to stick to
simpler activities everyone knew.
As far as my strength go and incorporating them into working the retreat I feel as though
I really connected with this group. I knew that the group was musically oriented, and I had some
past musical experience myself so I really wanted to see them succeed. My connectedness drove
me to use my past musically experiences to help design the full value contract and gave me the
idea to play music between activities. As for my adaptability, when we didnt quite stick to the
schedule I was able to come up with a plan as to what we should do next and still make it seem

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like it was part of the plan all along. With my communication I was also able to explain things
clearly to both my team and the musically inclined group. When a member of my team didnt
quite understand how to explain activity I was able to clarify to the group about how to go about
playing big booty, or honey do you love me.
When I think of this experience the first thing that comes to mind is Sanfords theory of
challenge and support. The theory talks about how in order to grow people need the appropriate
amount of challenge and support, otherwise we get stuck in our comfort zone, or worse end up in
our panic zone. When making the agenda I wanted to try to push my team to try things that they
hadnt done before. When we decided on doing blanket volleyball Megan said herself that she
wanted to run this activity because she hadnt ever seen it before and wanted to try it for herself.
Maddie signed up as a shadow, but I wanted to challenge her and gave her an easy initiative and
getting to know you type game. She was nervous so I help as much as I could on human know
letting her know it was ok to stop them if she didnt think that they could finish. I gave her my
opinion on the situation but ultimately left the decision in her hands, and she let the group finish.
With Musically Inclined, during blanket volleyball we started off with them just trying to do it
normally, but after a couple mess ups we decided to start blindfolding people to see if they were
up for the added challenge. Even though they couldnt see the blindfolded members kept
encouraging the group and supporting them. We then asked if they wanted to up the challenge
more by blindfolding a 2nd person on each team, they unanimously agreed to do so. Through their
team dynamic they were supporting each other and making sure that they were all still enjoying
the activity, even if they only successfully caught the object being tossed 1 out of every 10
throws.

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From my first lead facilitator experience I think I have a huge new appreciation for
everyone that has everyone who has done it in the past, especially for those that didnt have as
great groups. In the future Ill try to stay away from activities like human knot as an initiative
because of the very different results that you can get from going for 20+ minutes. I will use this
experience to know what an ideal group is like, but I should also remember that most groups
dont have the same functionality as Musically Inclined. I think the personalized full value
contract really made the group connect with it and made them more willing to open up so in the
future Ill try to make an equally personalized full value contract for groups.
Im so happy to have been able to lead the Musically Inclined retreat this year because of
all the great things I hear about them last year. The retreat was a very fun and they were an easy
group so they helped make the process that much more fun on my end of things. My team did a
fantastic job of running it and I hope that they got as much of the experience as I did.

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Student Organization Leadership Consultants

Musically Inclined Retreat
November 20th, 2016
Group:
Musically Inclined
Group Contact & info:
SOLC Contact:
Daniel McDonagh
Goal of Retreat:
bond as a group, keep it all on a good note
# Participants:
15-20
Date:
11/20/16
Time:
11am-3pm
Location:
Union Ballroom
Facilitators:
Natascha, Megan, Luis
Food Requests:
Yes Pizza@1
Special Requests/Needs:
none
Retreat Agenda:
Time/
location
11am
11:15
11:45
12:15
1:00
1:30
1:50
2:35
3:00

Topic/Activity
Waivers/Intros/WIPBAM
Bust a move
Big booty
FVC
Blanket Volleyball
Food
Linked-Up
Knot My Problem
Closing Clap/Evaluations
BYE

Handouts:
Evals
Waivers
FVC
General Supplies Check list:
Two blankets
Ball
Blindfolds
Rope

Facilitato
r
Dan
Luis
Natascha
Dan
Megan
Maddie
Maddie
Dan

Notes/Supplies needed
Waivers and stuf

Two blankets, ball

Rope
Evaluations