The Night a Minecraft Lego Chicken Taught Our Program About Belonging
Last night I added something brand new to our Minecraft realm: the Lego Chicken add on. None of the kids had ever seen it before, which meant we started the way we always do with something new. Someone finds the “how to” book in their inventory and starts reading. Someone else starts shouting out pieces of the instructions because everyone is too excited to read quietly.
“What’s jousting?!”
“Did you guys see how big the chicken is?”
“Omg, if you kill the chicken he turns into Lego bricks!”
“What do we do with these chickens?”
This is one of my favorite parts of running these programs. A brand new add on means nobody has the answers yet, so the kids have to figure it out together. That alone is social practice. But last night it turned into something bigger.
From a giant chicken to a real conversation
The chicken is huge. Genuinely enormous on screen. And that size sparked a conversation about CaseOh, a YouTuber several of the kids follow whose whole persona is making fun of himself for being overweight. (My brain, for the record, went straight to queso dip. Snacking, and talking about snacking, is always a valuable part of our sessions.)
While the kids built their giant chickens and talked about CaseOh, I saw an opening. I asked them: is it actually funny to make fun of someone for being fat? What if people were laughing at you because of something about your body, or how you move, or how you talk?
That question opened the door. And the kids walked right through it.
Chickens, chew necklaces, and being seen
The conversation shifted from CaseOh to the kids themselves. A few of them talked about being autistic. A few talked about wearing Lego chew necklaces, and about kids at school teasing them for having “chew toys.” They talked about characteristics, about boundaries, about what it feels like to be laughed at for something you can’t just turn off.
And then they told me something that stuck with me. They were grateful to be somewhere the chew necklaces were just normal. Somewhere they could talk about these things openly, without having to brace for a reaction.
Why this is the whole point
This is the part of the work that doesn’t show up on an intake form. A kid learning to take turns or read a room is important, and we build toward that every session. But what happened last night was something else. It was connection. It was kids recognizing pieces of themselves in each other, and realizing they weren’t the only ones.
It usually takes a group six to eight sessions before kids start to feel safe enough for moments like this. That’s not a coincidence and it’s not something you can rush. But once that safety is there, something opens up. Kids stop just practicing conversation and start actually having one, the kind that builds self worth and makes them feel genuinely connected to their peers, not just tolerated by them.
All from a giant Lego chicken.