The Web Association

one leaves behind.

It is again up to the facilitator to decide the balance of creativity and social empowerment.

Announcing the exercises, the facilitator can propose to make a Tree of Life for:

1. A fictional hero, a character created by their imagination and/or "borrowed" biographical elements of their favourite stories. 2. A hero based on reality, a character based on either the participant him- or herself or a person they know. A participant can use whatever real-life elements they wish and add any fictional elements they want. 3. The person themselves, the Tree of Life represents the life of the participant him- or herself.

Based upon this tree, the facilitator can invite the participants to create a five minute story using narrative structure as explained in the storytelling theory. Creating a fictional story will be the most light and fun, creating a personal story can be more intense but will definitely lead to introspection and personal development as the presenting of the created story represents the performance of their chosen identity. Creating a hero based on reality is a good middle way that is both light and fun but also provides introspection. Again, it is up for the facilitator to decide how to use the Three of Life. To help to create a story from the Tree of life, youths can use the next exercise.

Participants work individually (as homework) or in duo’s in this exercise (in session). They use pen and paper. The association web is an exercise that aims to provide a visualisation of a creative brainstorm. All these associations that can help a character/problem/location/theme get more rich with sub-themes and other thoughts.

The process starts by picking a subject. Write this in the middle of the paper, for instance 'Graduation'. Now all around this subject write all initial associations, like 'exams', 'stress', 'ceremony', ’studying'. Now take one of these and start associating around this subject, for instance take ’stress' and we can write down 'sleepless nights', 'headache', 'stomachache', 'biting nails' etc.

The Association Web is a great tool to help someone who is stuck in creating a story and help have new creative ideas. Or it helps starting a story as a participant can start with an event or character trade from the Tree of Life in the middle of the web that they feel is the strongest inspiration for their story.

The aim is to fit the Tree of Life, aided by the Association Web, into a narrative structure as seen in session 2. Then to create scenes (an accumulation of several characters in a location with a problem) as in session 3. Again, it is up to the facilitator to determine the balance between the fictional world and their own experienced life. Participants can create a story for a made-up hero based upon the word they feel the strongest with. But the facilitator can also