Make a Talking Stick

Here’s an idea for a family meeting or any group of kids or grown-ups you might work with. This beautiful and wonderfully useful Talking Stick comes from Jann Williams, a social work intern who has been developing a program to integrate the Grump Meter at the Hartland Partnership Center in Salt Lake. (http://partners.utah.edu/partnerships/community-capacity-building/unphartland-partnership-center/).

The Talking Stick is a low-budget craft: take a dowel--1 or 1-1/2 feet long--and wrap colored string around it in the Grump Meter sequence. Friendship bracelet string will work great. Jann has added a couple decorations—the beads in Grump Meter sequence that adorn the top of the stick, and the little “worry dolls” tied into each colored section.


Introduce the talking stick to your group, and let everyone know how to use it: “We’ll pass around the talking stick, and only the person who is holding it may speak. Each speaker, as we pass it around, is invited to share the color you are on, and why—what is your outside trigger (an event/situation outside of you that sends you up the Grump Meter), and what is your ‘inside feeling’?” This is a wonderful opening, check-in exercise for a group to create openness, safety, and trust. People can learn from each other and about each other as they share feelings by naming their color and reflecting on it.