Heritage Festival Volunteers

Listening Booths

Heritage Festival Sunday Sept 18 12-4

A listening booth is temporary spot, placed in a public park, a hospital lobby, a transit station; where mediators can invite community members to share stories and perspectives about topics of our or their choice. We’ll collect these stories to use as a platform for helping people in our community feel heard and to practice our own active listening skills.

We will set up four tray tables and eight chairs, we will have signs that will let people know what we are doing. We will go into the crowd and ask them if they would help us practice our listening skills.

Prepare a quick introduction. Sample: "Hello, my name is ______ . We are community mediators and would like to hear what on your mind in Adams County. We also could use some help with our active listening, would you give us a hand?” Some questions we might ask to get the conversation going are:

Adults:

Because we are working with other entitles that are focused on political violence and working on a de-escalation training, we thought the focus could be “political violence” Sone questions could be:

What are some examples of political violence? What is considered political violence?

What form of violence is used for political goals? Should America be worried about political violence? Should Adams County be worried?  Do you feel sometime violence is justified?

If the person is uncomfortable with that topic, lead them to something else by asking questions such as: is there anything in the news that bothers you? What would you love to talk about today? Keep it to 5-10 minutes per person if possible. Record basic info if there is time.

Children:

Include children in the listening booths if they are interested. Some possible questions are:

Do you watch the news?  Does any part of the news bother you?

Do you hear your parents talking about what is going on in the country?  Does any of that bother you?

If you are upset, do you have someone you can talk to? What do you talk to your friends about?