Pippa’s Pirates, ahoy!

When the day of team building came around I think it was safe to say we were all pretty wary of what was going to happen to us. All we knew was that we were to dress up in some totally insane costume and that we were going to be spending the day making fools of ourselves, with a group of people we barely knew.

When we all arrived at Rue Manguy on that Monday morning and were separated from our friends into our tutor groups, the conversation was limited and we were all left feeling slightly awkward, but, thankfully by the end of the day we had bonded well and we were merrily chatting away like we had known each other for years.

The first task of the day had the tutor group taking part in the military style obstacle course. To say that we didn’t have very strong friendship bonds, the team showed a great sense of team work even with it being the very first day, and even with the fact that we barely knew each other.

After defeating the ‘Smurf’ tutor group at the obstacle course we moved on to the ‘Crocodile River’ which consisted of the whole tutor group walking across planks of wood (obviously a natural talent for us pirates) and all squeezing onto tyres in order to cross the river and get to safety. Within our three attempts of the activity we defeated the current time score. However, unfortunately, throughout the day we were beaten by another tutor group. After surviving the Crocs the group headed inside to try our hands at scaling the rock climbing wall.
After all this, the group had definitely earned the break we received, where we all sat around chatting and snacking on the picnic to which everybody had contributed. Up next was archery, there were definitely a couple of people in the tutor group that were naturals, whereas the rest of us all seemed to lack the aim that was needed to even get the arrow to the target.

Moving on from that, we came to the drawbridge. The team built an A-shaped frame made out of three logs and three pieces of rope, which was then positioned in a small stream with a piece of rope attached. The aim was to get the whole team across the stream using the A-frame as a ‘drawbridge’. After safely getting the whole team across the bridge, the challenge of getting as many people across in one go came about. After two tries we managed to get 10 of the tutor group across the river in one go with only 3 or 4 minor injuries!

After this the rain started to come down. We moved onto our next section of ‘playground games. However this session was cut short due to the bad weather conditions. The whole tutor group sat down to a feast of a picnic.

Due to the weather the day was cut short with most going home shortly after the lunch was finished. This was a real shame. It was an extremely fun day in which the whole group bonded and became friends. It was definitely a worthwhile experience and the relationships in the group were defiantly built upon. If the weather had been better the day would have been even more amazing, but it was excellent as it was. All in all it was a fantastic day and experience.

Words by:  Aimee Leale   12.2  

TEAM BULDING DAY 2010  

We arrived at Rue Mainguy and got together in the hall. We won before the day had even started.  After a brief introduction we set off to our first activity which was creating a part of a huge piece of art. We painted four squares and finished successfully with two masterpieces.

After we had finished painting we moved back down to the hall and started on a very difficult challenge called the Zin Challenge. We used our team’s mathematical minds (mainly the girls) and managed to work out the answer in record time.

We then had a quick break to drink and eat before we went outside to challenge 12.6 to an assault course. We had to run along a plank, around some barrels through a tube, over a bench, under a net, over an apparatus and along a suspended plank while keeping as much water in the bucket and of course we beat them.

We assembled for a team photo but the staff threw the buckets full of water over us and people got soaked! Sodden wet, we walked to the next activity which involved walking over a high suspended log. We had our girls go over first and in no time we had almost doubled our opponent’s points thanks to our brave Miss Snodden. During lunch the prizes were given out and our team won for the best team name award 5Alive!
We also had the two boys who won the ‘Best Groover’s Award’. Unfortunately are other rewards were stolen from us by 12 3!

Word From Team 5ALIVE!

Things are about to change.....

These were the words that skimmed through my mind as I glanced into an ocean of unfamiliar faces that surrounded me relentlessly like a crashing wave. My anxiety fed on such unfamiliarity; I unquestionably doubted the impact of such ‘bonding’ sessions between people who were primarily strangers. Going into the day, it was obvious to notice a stark segregation between different schools and different groups of friends, tension flowing through the air like heat from a raging fire.

I admit myself that I had little confidence in such a Team Building Day to provide what it was supposed to provide. Despite my expectations, I was soon to have such doubt wash away.

The day began like no other, dressed loosely in ‘farmer-ish’attire, I walked into the midst of a visual vindication that today would be a day that incited many memorable moments. Being passed by a crowd of smurfs on the way in, I allowed myself to question whether or not I was walking into Rue Mainguy, or into a vivid and quixotic hallucination. However, this was not the creation of madness, but seemingly a day where conformity would be forgotten and left to subside into obscurity.

After meeting up with the rest of my tutor group, the day consisted of many strategic team building exercises used to test our ability to work together under the mutual lure of being victorious. Forging friendships seemed to be the order of the day, a day born in a dawn of new acquaintances, old friends and current friendships that all gathered momentum under the stimulus of teamwork and success.

Bridging the vast void between unfamiliarity of others and appreciating each and every diverse personality is not something that would have been expected to occur in a day.

Ultimately our farmer-ish antics assured us the awards we inevitably deserved.  Hooray for 12.3!

Words by:  Aaron Carpenter 12.3