Strike a Pose on Zoom

1. Have participants set themselves up for the activity. They'll need to set their Zoom view to grid mode, position themselves physically so they can easily move their body, and make sure captures their upper body (and not just their head), while also comfortably viewing their screen.
2. Let participants know that in a moment you’ll be giving them a prompt, a five second countdown, then they’ll respond by striking a pose and freezing in place.
3. Check to see if there are any questions on the directions. Also take a moment to check that everyone's upper bodies are framed in their cameras.
4. State the prompt and begin counting down. When you finish the countdown tell participants to “Hold their pose." Instruct them, "Look at the screen and see what you notice about other people’s poses.”
5. After 10-15 seconds release the group from their poses and reset.
6. Optional: repeat steps 4 and 5 with new prompts as many times as you'd like.

Set up your space so that you can easily role model the pose striking and camera framing for participants.

It's not important that you or the participants are able to see every single person in the group for this activity to work. As long as participants can see most other participants, or even a few other people, that's good enough.

Get questions and clarifications on the instructions out of the way before you give them the prompt. You want participants to have a limited amount of time to react to the prompt to prevent overthinking.

When facilitating this activity virtually you may be tempted to take a screenshot of the group for reference, but this can make participants uncomfortable and stifle the experience. Striking a pose is already awkward for many participants, and the fleeting nature of the pose helps ease that feeling.

If you're using apps other than Zoom, here are the specific things your software will need to be able to do: