icebreaker ideas
- Have 1 balloon for each person in the group. Give them all a piece of paper and inside it have them draw a picture of themselves and put it in the balloon. Then have the leader of the group start by introducing themselves chapter/city, age etc. and then pop the balloon. They then have to guess who drew the picture in the balloon. Give then a few guesses and then repeat the process.
- Do some low ropes initiatives type games. Start with introductions and them you can do trust falls and a game where you get everyone to sit on each other in a circle. (To do it they have to be in a tight circle and just sit down at the same time. But have them figure it out.)
- Slogans - Do introductions and after each person introduces themselves, have them say a slogan ex: Subway-Eat Fresh or Nike-Just Do It. Once everyone has said their slogan, go around the circle and have them add at the end a phrase that you so desire such as (to keep this appropriate for on-line conversation) "In my car" or another place (you can altar that location as you wish).
- Get some sort of multicolored candy such as M&M's or Mike and Ike's and have them say a different thing for each color. Like name, favorite sport, their Hebrew name, what they do during the summer, or just something they would like to say about themselves.
- Toilet Paper has many uses - Pass a roll of toilet paper around the circle and tell everyone to take the amount of toilet paper they would "use." Then for every piece they took, they have to tell the group, "Something you may not know about me is..."
- Grid (Very large group) - Make a bingo type game where every square is filled with something to accomplish, like find 5 people you don't know and make a pyramid (have a staff sign the square on the paper), find a junior you don't know (have them sign the square) etc.
- Something to do while doing introductions...after name, age etc...thing of a food with the same beginning letter as you first name ex: Kiwi Kevin
- I Have Never - Have one person start in the middle of the circle and say, "I have never..." and all the people who have done that have to get up and find a new spot in the circle. Whoever doesn't get a spot, has to say, "I have never..." and it repeats.
- Dominoes - Have whoever that wants to start say, ex: "On my left arm I have a brother and on my right arm I've been to Israel." Who ever has (done) any of those things will then go and connect arms. The next person will say on my left/right arm I have (the thing they connected to) and on my other (left/right) arm I have (a new thing).
- Count to Ten - Tell the group to get into a tight circle and tell them, as a group, we are going to count to ten. *One person can't say all of the numbers* Without devising a plan, have them start. Tell them that if the number is yelled by more than one person at one time, they need to start over again. If they get past ten and time permits, see how high your group can go.
- Clothes Pin Tag -
You get your group in a circle and have everyone go around and say their names (it is important that you emphasize the importance of remembering the names for later success in the game).
Then you hand each person two or more clothespins. The object of the game is to be the first person without any clothespins. To get rid of your clothespins, you need to pin it onto the shirt of another person, but to be able to do that you have to know the name of the person you are pinning. If someone pins you, you can take that pin off yourself and pin it onto someone else. This is really fun because everyone gets to run around and be crazy while learning other people's names. - How's Yours? - Send one person out of the room. Then, the remaining people will think of a body part (appropriate please!). When the person outside comes back in, they must go around the room and ask everyone "How's yours?" and everyone answers with a word that describes the body part. (For example: if you choose thumb...you could say opposable) The person gets 3 chances to guess the body part. And you can lather, rinse and repeat as desired.
- Two Truths and A Lie (For large and/or small groups) -
- Pick three people to go outside and two of the people have to tell a true story that happened to them and one person has to make one up. The group then has to figure out which person is telling the lie.
- Another way of playing this is, everyone goes around and tells three facts or stories about them, one of which is a lie. For example, "I have two brothers, I go to camp and I have a cat." One of those is a lie, and the group had to guess which it is. (The group can definitely make them more exciting.)
With contributions by:
- Rachel Case
- Jenna Citron
- Andrea Rowan
- Abbie Steiner
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