Fa-silly-tators!

Non-formal education can seem pretty silly: We make participants run around a room and shout the sounds of animals. We make them pretend like they are ninjas or space aliens in order to energize them in the morning. But even though we all use humour, when we coordinate volunteering projects, run youth exchanges or facilitate seminars – we almost never stop for a moment and reflect deeply on what that actually means. This seminar will be a space for that.

'Fa-silly-tators' is a 7-day seminar that will bring together 32 participants from 20 countries in Europe. By experiencing non-formal education methods such as drawing challenges, speed dating, brainstorming techniques and silent discussion, the participants will get to explore humour and jokes. They will learn and exchange methods and best practices on how to use humour to empower youth with fewer opportunities and marginalized groups, how to do humour from a feminist/antiracist/queer/etc. lens, when to use humour and how to deal with conflicts around it.

The project has the following objectives:

• • Understand how laughter can support learning

  • Reflect on humour in connection to teambuilding and a seminar group owning the space that they are working in

  • Exchange (the silliest) energizers and point out sexism, racism or other stereotypes in energizers

  • Identify conflicts around humour, e.g. when it comes to humour in relation to stereotypes and marginalized groups

  • Reflect on the challenges and potentials of intercultural humour in creating an intercultural team as well as awareness on Europe among young people

  • Understand the importance of finding the right timing for humour

  • Discuss how humour can be used to create a safe learning and exchanging space as well as destroy it

  • Come up with certain rules and conclusion about humour in NFE that in the future will help us and others identify whether a joke, game etc. they were using was timely and appropriate or not

  • Create a collection of (non-formal education) tools and guidelines for youth workers and NFE practitioners for the usage of humour in NFE

  • Networking between organisations and networks