Origin Stories – OneHE

Activity

Community building activities, Ongoing engagement, Warm up activities

Origin Stories

Felecia Caton Garcia

Heather Wright

This reflective activity challenges students’ perception of the world by decentering colonial ways of knowing and being.

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ACTIVITY PURPOSE

This activity could be used as a community-building exercise, or even possibly an icebreaker, where students get to share more about themselves, in a new and different way. It engages students’ creative and critical thinking through story, allowing them to recognise the degree to which ‘origin‘ stories shape our understanding of the world, ourselves, others, teaching, and learning, etc., and recognising that sometimes we must write our own.

USEFUL FOR

Reflection, creativity, decentering colonial ways of knowing and being. Students could also use their own origin stories to begin to think about broader original stories related to a project, or course content. For example, what is the origin story of a particular theory or concept?

PREPARATION

It is helpful to offer participants examples of ‘origin‘ stories. One great source is Eduardo Galleano’s Memory of Fire: Genesis, but they can be drawn from anywhere.

INSTRUCTIONS

Ask students to choose something that is of interest to them. It could be an object, an animal, a feeling, a person. Invite them to answer the questions ‘How did [whatever they chose, for example, pomegranates, snow, sadness, turtles, poetry, you] come into existence?’
Give the students ten minutes to create an ‘origin’ story on what they have chosen to write about. It does not have to be finished or the best thing they have ever written.
Ask the students to share their origin story in their preferred medium.

DURATION

10 -30 minutes.

ADAPTATIONS AND EXAMPLES

Do you have any suggestions? Please share them in the comments below.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

Something to write on and with, , or access to an electronic device if required.

USEFUL RESOURCES

Galleano, E. (1988). Memory of Fire: Genesis.

ABOUT

Educator prep: None
Student prep: None
Synchronous, Asynchronous
No tech needed
Duration: 5-30 mins

This activity is one of a series of activities from Equity Unbound, focused on equitable online community building.

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