New Games Workshops with Dale Le Fevre


New Games Workshops For Professional or Personal Development What's new about New Games? Who should attend? What you will learn and experience at a workshop The New Games workshop process A word about our director What participants and people say about New Games New Games workshops worldwide by Dale N. Le Fevre

Workshops Calendar

New Games Workshops introduce you to the fundamentals of a unique play program. At a New Games workshop, you can explore your creativity and develop skills for bringing people closer together through play. This training will enable you to organize and lead New Games events using your own local resources.

What's new about New Games?

More than a list of games, New Games is an attitude toward play. The idea is that people can and should play together for the fun of it. Some of the games you've played before. Some we've changed a little. Others are new or are invented by you! New Games is for everybody.

New Games offers an addition and a new direction to traditional sports. Using little or no equipment, we play games that are exciting and enjoyable without requiring any athletic ability. The players - anyone who wants to play - are the main ingredient. By re-examining the basic ideas of competition and cooperation, New Games provides a recreational experience that is both challenging and joyous.

Through the games we play and the way we play them, we encourage participation, creativity, and personal expression. The playful spirit is free to emerge from within. As partners rather than opponents, we compete against the limits of our own abilities instead of against each other. Ultimately, in playing together, we learn to live together.

PLAY HARD
        PLAY FAIR
                Nobody Hurt

Who Should Attend?

Anyone who wants to experience joyful play
Recreation Leaders
Teachers
Physical Education Instructors
Community Organizers
Personnel Directors
Social Workers
School Activities Coordinators
Health Professionals, including physical therapists and mental health workers
Parents
Religious Activities Directors
Camp Directors
Anyone who leads or is part of a group

In New Games, the goal is for everyone to have fun playing together. The people playing are the most important part of any game. Games are changed to meet player's needs. As a result, the New Games concept can be used in any area of human relations to create a bond of trust, communication, and community.

At a workshop you will learn how to:

Play many New Games
Facilitate a new style of play that encourages freedom and creativity
Integrate cooperation and competition
Use many New Games in your program
Increase participation in your program by including people usually left out of more traditional sport programs
Involve the community in your program
Plan and organize successful, well attended events
Adapt any games so that everyone can play

You will also experience these new ideas:

Creating the play community
The playful games leader
Creative Play
Changing rules to meet player's needs
Soft War
Energy Flow
Trust Games

The New Games workshop process

We begin each workshop with a play session because our first aim is to develop the New Games spirit within the participants. The best way to do this is by playing together to experience first-hand the feeling and flow of the games. Also, a variety of games are learned. From this knowledge, understanding New Games concepts and methods follows naturally.

The participants then focus on their experiences of play and leadership styles they have encountered. This is accomplished through playful process sessions in which the workshop leader facilitates analysis of the concepts and methods.

From discussions we move to practical sessions in which participants learn to adapt and invent new games, and practice leading games among themselves. Finally, an open play session is held to give workshop participants an opportunity to apply the games leading skills they have developed with members of their community.

After each session, the practical experiences are discussed and evaluated. From these sessions, participants develop the competence and confidence to apply New Games in their own programs and settings. Throughout the workshop, the orientation is toward participation rather than winning. This is the same principle that underlies all New Games. Playing is winning.

A Word About Our Director

What Participants and People Say About New Games:

"I arrived feeling resentful that I had to get up so early and give up a weekend I badly needed for myself. After one game I knew I wouldn't have missed it for anything."
Betty Armstrong, Albany School District, California

"I watched you playing and I thought 'I'm too old.' Then you invited me to join and I still thought 'I'm too old.' I've been a businessman for 40 years and haven't had time to play. Finally I thought, 'I'm not too old.' "
A man who joined us in a Stockholm, Sweden, park

"Look at the faces of these people, they're smiling! This is the most exciting development in physical education in 50 years."
Seymour M. Gold, University of California, Davis

"By all means let us cherish the traditional sports... but we have signed no contract to suffer their extremes. The time has come to move on, to games in which there are no second string players - to New Games."
George Leonard, Author, from his book, THE ULTIMATE ATHLETE

"When I drove my car back home Sunday evening I suddenly knew it: During the workshop I had the opportunity to play myself and you know what I found out? I liked myself! And this hasn't happened for a long time! What I liked most about you? Your patience with us, you flexibility and your hesitation sometimes. You are not perfect, too! And you are not afraid to show this."
Gerian Dijkhuizen, Psychiatric worker at Zonne and Schild in Amersfoort, Holland

"Thank you for the book full of fun ideas and a weekend full of fun games. I can't remember the last time I played so much."
Amy Earl, Christchurch United Methodist Church, Santa Rosa, CA

"Looking back on my own experiences with play and P.E., I realized that I had no role models. My childhood memories of P.E. were nightmares that still haunt me - frightening, highly competitive times with little or no adult supervision where children got hurt emotionally and physically. As a new elementary school teacher I vowed this would not happen in my classroom."

"My experience in your New Games workshop gave me an opportunity to re-evaluate my definition of play and build my own self-esteem. In our discussion of leadership skills and in leading a new game, I realized how important it was for me to not only be a facilitator but a participant, too."
Suzanne James, elementary teacher, San Jose, CA

"Our little group continues at Alexandra - we play games every Wednesday afternoon and I think you would be proud of the progress - it is a great joy to me personally. One of our doddery old ladies said to me this week 'I'll never leave these games, they keep me so active!' So the little seed sown is flourishing! Thank you for all you gave us."
Judy, Head Administrator, Western Cape Forum for the Mentally Handicapped, Capetown, Rep. of S. Africa

"It was fun to see some of the reserved and competitive students loosen up and cooperate with other students who they normally do not associate with."
Susan D. Knupper, teacher, McKinleyville, CA

New Games workshops worldwide by Dale N. Le Fevre

EDUCATION
San Diego State University, CA
German Sports Academy, Cologne, Germany
Ben Gurion, Bar Ilan, and Hebrew University, Israel
City of London University
The Open University, Britain
North Valley School, Santa Rosa, CA
Alameda Co. Office of Ed., Hayward, CA
Mendocino Co. Office of Ed, Ukiah, CA
Santa Rosa JR College, CA
Sonoma State University, Humboldt State
California Universities: CSU Sacramento, CSU Fresno, CSU San Bernardino, CSU Stanislaus
Orange Co. Office of Education, CA

RECREATION
Cal. Poly State U, San Luis Obispo, Calif.
Department of Play Parks, Stockholm, Sweden
Wingate Institute, Israel
Youth and Community Services, Dundee, Scotland
Holiday Summer Camps, Jerusalem
Days of Play, Olympic Stadium, Munich
National Union of Students, Wales

PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH
Napa Valley Psychiatric Hospital, Napa, CA
Red Cross, Amersfoort, Holland
Assoc. of Humanistic Psychology, Genªve, Switzerland
Raddery School (emotionally disturbed), Black Isle, Scot.
Landschaftsverband, Germany
Gil Am Youth Detention Center, Haifa, Israel
Intermediate Treatment Resource Centres in Belfast, Northern Ireland

CULTURAL
Theatre Workshop, Edinburgh, Scotland
Memobeurs Fair, Hilversum, Holland
Group de Chamarande, Paris, France
Neva Shalom (Jewish-Arab Community), Israel

MEDITATION AND MOVEMENT
Shenoa Retreat Center, Philo, CA
Findhorn Community, Forres, Scotland
Auroville Tenth Anniversary, Pondicherry, India
S'hort, Ibiza, Spain
Mitzpe Lavon Community, Israel
Zeitlos Centre, Berlin, Germany
Hwayu Tai Chi Institut, Copenhagen, Denmark
Green Gulch Zen Farm, Mill Valley, CA

LANGUAGE SCHOOLS
DSGL, Munich, Germany
SKILL, Heidelberg, Germany
Goethe Institute, Munich
IGL, Prague, Czech Repubic

MISCELLANEOUS
Die Gruenen (Green Party), Germany
Party of Urban Development and Human Rights, Austria
Monkton Wyld (Families), Dorset, England
Little Grove, Chesham, England)

Workshops Calendar

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