KaBOOM! Forums

Draley:

There are a lot of resources in the Toolkit that can help create a Build Day Plan of Action...everything from team checlists to monitor progress, to last minute check lists to make sure you've thought of all the small details.   We did a build last year, and learned that the Build Day Plan needs to be flexible.  In the early morning, we had fewer volunteers show up than expected, but by mid-morning, we had what we needed. The build was actually completed about 90 minutes earlier than expected!

Some things you might to include in your build day plan might be:

Early Morning Site Prep.  Meet with your Build Team Captains before all the volunteers arrive to put all of the playground equipment and hardware into specific areas to be built...swing equipment & hardware in one location, decks in another....side project(s) in another.  This helps the Build Captains know where they'll be and what they'll be building. This is also a great time to set up the tents, tables, chairs, etc. for the safety station, volunteer registration, food area, boom box, etc.

Volunteer Registration Check-In and Breakfast

Opening Ceremony - welcome and introductions, SHORT speeches from dignitaries, and a "Warm-Up" exercise that will set the tempo for the day!

Let's Get to Work!

Lunch! It makes sense to assign teams to taking a lunch break.  If you are the Project Manager, you'll need to monitor the progress of different teams so one team doesn't get too far ahead of the other team. Assigning people to lunch based on their progress helps to allow slower teams to catch up, and faster teams to take a break.

Mid-Day Motivators (Give-Away Drawings, some friendly competition between teams, progress reports, etc.)

Closing Ceremony: Think about the "Thank You" part of the plan...how can you engage the children in saying thanks!

Hope this helps & Good Luck!