In connection with subproject 1, three explorative workshops have been held. These workshops are a part of the project’s preliminary exploration of experiences, possibilities, dilemmas and challenges in regard to working with those special characteristics that vulnerable children and youth develop, as a potential resource in their further development.
Bringing ideas into play is an integrated part of subproject 1. Namely in the workshops, the participants are invited to take part in a creative thinking process together with us and to come up with concrete suggestions about how ‘deviation’ can be seen as a resource.
The three workshops are inspired by the future workshop method, developed by Robert Jungk to allow stakeholders to become involved in creating their preferred future. The workshops are divided into a critique phase, utopia phase and realisation phase. At first, the participants work on producing descriptions of a number of critical experiences with vulnerable children and youth. Subsequently, these negative descriptions are turned upside down and the task is to find the strengths and resources in these descriptions. Finally, the aim is to formulate some concrete solutions or instructions for action to professionals working with this group of children and young people.
The objective of the workshops is thus to get an insight into the participants’ experiences and visions and to involve them in the creative thinking process of the project.
How this work is set about varies from workshop to workshop as the working methods brought into play differ depending on the group of participants. For instance, in our youth workshop more time has been allotted. This opens up for a number of more creative working methods, which increase the quality of participation for those whose preferred form of communication is not in writing and speech.
