TEAM BUILDING GAMES
AIESEC City
SHNAY CHOHAN & DAN BELL
Possibility Opportunity Excellence
www.aieseccity.org
AIESEC City
INTRO Why use team building games? Team building games are a great way to break the ice, especially with new teams. There are two different types of team building games you can do: G2K “Get to know” – these are games that often involves verbal activity. People talking to each other and getting to know each other on a more personal level.
[10] {2}
G2T “Get to Touch”- These are games that involve a level of physical activity, often touching each other to allow them to become more comfortable with other’s presence. (Be careful not to bring these games in too early, as people may be put off by the idea of having their personal space broken. Also take into consideration cultural backgrounds, male - female interaction etc) The group sizes below are recommended, larger groups may be split up but keep in mind the recommended time allocations at the same time. Group sizes will appear as they do to the left, e.g. {2} means they need to be in pairs, {10} would mean that they should be in groups of 10 etc. The timings of the activity are also there: [10] means the activity is likely to take 10 minutes, [2:30] would mean that the activity was likely to take 2 and a half minutes etc.
[15] {2}
G2K GAMES
Secrets The task is for the participants to tell each other 1-3 things they don’t know about each other. Give some time for the audience to think of things and don’t worry if they don’t start straight away, it will take time.. This can also be used for teams that know each other quite well.
[15] {2}
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G2K GAMES Funny/Embarrassing Stories The task is for the participants to tell each other a funny or embarrassing story. It would be beneficial to have a funny/embarrassing story lined up to give as an example. This can somewhat “set the trend” so that others make an effort to tell a good story. You could also give a prize to the funniest/most embarrassing story.
[5-10] {10}
[20] {20}
DJ Sam Get the participants to write the letters D-J-S-A-M on their finger tips, one letter per finger, in any order (get a picture of the letters muddled up on the finger tips, or show it on your own) Then everyone should get up and walk around with their hand out, letters facing them, and get someone else to pick a finger. Depending on which letter gets chosen they have to do the following things. So if they pick : D- Tell them your Dream J- Tell them a Joke/Journey S- Tell them a Secret A- Ask them a question M- Give them a Massage It is crucial that you explain this game properly, the best way to do this is to do a demonstration with a co-faci or one of the participants. It would be a good idea to get involved with this game yourself, it will help you get to know your audience.
My name is... and I go... Stand in a Circle, start by saying your name and say “when I’m happy I go ….” Say something loud and funny, for example “WHOOOPAHH” and do an action also, for example a lunge. Then get the person next to you copy what you did and then do their own, etc. It will get around the whole circle and can be very entertaining . The aim of this game is to get people to see a small piece of your personality and to facilitate a team remembering all their names.
[20] {10} [30-40] {10}
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I’m an animal! A quick game to break the ice and let the team know a little more about each other. It can also be used with proper feedback to improve presentation skills. Cut out pictures of lots of different animals, put them in a hat. Let people pick the animal out of the hat, and they have to do a 2 min presentation with 1 marker and 1 flipchart of why they are that animal. Give them some prep time, but not much. What qualities do they have etc. Tell them to make it funny and creative, it is not a serious exercise, but it’s more to give everyone a confidence boost.
Pass the Parcel Preparation – Write a list of questions, each becoming more personal than the next. Start off with funny, bubbly questions and try to get more in depth as you go on. There is a list of sample questions at the end of this document. You should use more or less depending on the group size. Then write or print off the questions on a piece of paper, then wrap them up in a ball, putting the lighter bubbly questions on the outside, and the more in depth questions on the inside. Task -Get them to sit down in small groups and give them a ball each, let them answer the questions. It is important that if you see any quiet groups a Faci should go and ask more open questions “what, why, where, how” to make them elaborate on their answers.
[15] {25}
The game with a name! At the beginning of the session, give everybody a blank name badge. Tell them not to write on it, and make sure they put it high up near their shoulder, (you may want to warn female participants not to put it on their breast). They need to walk around the room, introduce themselves to each other, and find people with common letters in their name. For example, Jamie and Fred both have the letter ‘E’ in their name, so Jamie would right ‘E’ on Fred’s name badge and vice versa. Daniel and Shnay however share both an ‘A’ and an ‘N’ so they should write both letters on each other’s name badges. Tell the delegates to go and complete their names, ambitious delegates can complete their second names as well.
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Speed Networking Depending on the group sizes you may want to put the audience in circles or two long lines. We found that two long lines is a lot easier for a large group rather than lots of little circles. Here are both versions of the game. Two Lines
[20] {10+}
Separate the audience in to 2 teams, the exact number in each team, (if there is an off number get a facilitator to jump in). Get the two teams in two straight lines, and get them to face each other. Tell them that they have 2 minutes to tell each other a funny/embarrassing story about themselves. After two minutes get one line to move one person down to the left, and have the person on the end of the line to run to the empty space at the other end of the line, repeat the process every 2 minutes.
and switch
Logistically this can be difficult, so make sure you explain it clearly, a diagram such as the above can help. If using the above example, explain only the green group moves. Circles You need to have an inner circle facing outwards and an outer circle facing inwards as shown.
The principle is the same, after 2 minutes rotate the outwards circle clockwise and repeat the process until each person in the circle has spoken to each other.
For an easy way to split the participants into even groups check the tips at the end.
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Rock, Paper, Scissors For those who don’t know, I will explain the rock, paper, scissors game first.
[10] {20+}
There are 3 signs to be made with your hands:The Rock- a clenched fist The Paper- a straight hand The Scissors- Stick your 2 fingers out, like a “peace” sign Ideally you should play with just one other person, and on the count of 3 you show your sign. Rock beats the scissors rock smashes them Paper beats the rock paper wraps around the rock Scissors beat the paper scissors cut paper So now I will explain the team building game behind this game. Basically if you have a medium to large size group, get them to all play the game. But then whoever looses becomes the “fan” of the winner, and they should then cheer and shout when the winner goes to play the next person. Then the winner from that game gets cheered for by all of the losers from previous games. Eventually you will have 2 massive groups cheering for 2 people, then get everyone to cheer for the winner. The idea behind this is that they are not just cheering for 1 person as a team: but rather they are cheering for each other. And everyone is behind them in succeeding.
[15] {10+}
For this game make sure you explain it properly, do this by using examples and demonstrations so that everything is clear.
Haribo Sharing Game Get everyone to sit in a circle and open a bag of Haribo sweets. Pass the bag of sweets around the circle and get everyone to take 1 sweet out. They must tell us a different thing about themselves depending on the sweet. Heart - Who they most admire and why? Egg - What is their favourite food? Teddy Bear - A childhood memory Ring - A funny story You can change these to whatever you like, but the principle behind the game is the same.
[10] {20} [15] {8}
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G2T GAMES Crocodile Pond Get a small number of chairs, e.g. 5 chairs for 6-8 people. Put 3 chairs on one side of an area, and two on the other side of the area. Explain that there are crossing a pond full of crocodiles and they have only the 3 chairs to get across, they must all go across to the 2 other chairs at the other side of the area at the same time and they cannot touch the floor, otherwise they must start again! This activity involves a lot of touching and teamwork and is a good way to break the ice.
Untangle Depending on the group sizes split the group into teams of no less than 10. Get them to make a circle, ideally you want no less than 10 people per circle. Tell everyone to close their eyes and put both of their hands out. Everyone should then grab two arms. Then tell them to open their eyes and to try to untangle themselves, forming either a straight line or a circle.
[15] {~8}
Mirror Image With this game you need at least two teams of at least 5 people and no more than 10 each team. You should separate the teams by a sheet or blanket in-between them, they must not be able to see through, over or around. Whisper to one group a shape or a famous building, e.g. the Eifel Tower and tell them to make the shape using themselves. Give them a couple of minutes to do this. Once they are done, their task is to describe to the other team exactly what shape they have made, but by no means can they mention the name. They aim is to get them in an exact mirror image as the opposite team. Give them around 5-10 minutes to do this. Once they are done put down the blanket and let them see whether they are symmetrical or not. You can do a very good debrief on this activity, get them to talk about what difficulties that had in terms of communication and what they could improve on next time around. This is also a particularly good session for discussing inter-departmental communication, possibly in a skills session, having different departments as the teams.
[15] {5}
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G2K GAMES The Tallest Tower This is a good team bonding activity; it can also be used for assessment centres. Give them materials, for example Blue Tac, spaghetti, a balloon, some pencils, a paper cup etc and tell them to work as a team to build the tallest tower possible. It is good to analyse the teams and see how the members are participating. Make sure they are aware of the time limit. A good debrief of this activity can be done afterwards to also make the audience think of what they did, how they felt and how it could be improved next time.
Help is at Hand Another very good game for discussing the merits of inter-departmental communication, and in particular, inter-departmental collaboration. You will need a sheet for each department, and at least 5 or 6 people per department, if there are too many in the departments you should get them to select a team, the others should be quiet observers.
[20] {6}
Ask them to come up with a team name. Arrange the sheets on the ground so that there is just enough space for the teams to fit on. Also, arrange the sheets close enough so that people may jump from one to another, but so it’s not obvious. The task, is for the participants to turn over their sheets as fast as possible. Tell them, when they are finished, to sit down. They will no doubt struggle in turning their sheets over, but after an amount of time a team will succeed and sit down, and probably laugh at the remaining teams trying. If the remaining teams do not succeed after a good while, ask everyone to sit. Debrief: first of all, they most likely did not communicate, when one team succeeded, they will not tell the other team the recipe for success, but rather watch them struggle, a bit of schadenfreude? Explain that, over and above that: they missed out on the easiest possible way for them all to reach their goals. If they had jumped over to the other ‘departments’ they would easily be able to turn the sheets. Explain that in AIESEC, we have a common goal. A goal that only succeeds if everyone’s aligned and helping each other. Communicate, collaborate and coordinate!
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EXTRAS Grouping People Labels A very easy way to ensure that you have even teams, ideal for games like pass the parcel is using numbered labels. If you want 5 groups for example: number labels from 1-5, (8 groups? - label 1-8) and repeat for the total amount of participants you expect. Then when you give out the labels, make sure you do it in sequence as people enter the room. For example: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 1, 2, 3, ........ This is also a good way to get people to know people they haven’t already met as people will tend to come in with people they already know. Know, you need simply call for them to split into the relevant groups to start the activity. Numbered signs (1,2,3,4 & 5) around the room can help this.
Mingle Mingle Tell everyone to stand up. Tell them to walk around the room, when they bump into each other they are to say “mingle, mingle” and smile. Tell them that you will call out numbers, when you do, they are to get into groups of that number and sit down as fast as possible. Call out some numbers at random for a few tries, and then finally cal out the number of people you want in the groups for the activity. Simply ask them to stay in those groups for the activity. People will mess up here, so it wont be as exact as the labelling, but will work fine if you want to split them into smaller groups for discussions etc.
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G2K GAMES Pass the Parcel : Sample Questions The questions are in order of depth, and so the question at this end should be on the outside of the paper ball, the last question, should be on the inside.
1.
If you would be a vegetable which one would you be and why?
2.
Which Superpower would you like to have and why?
3.
What is the longest time period you have stayed awake for and why?
4.
I would rather shoot myself in the foot than …. (complete the sentence)
5.
Tell us a childhood memory.
6.
If I was in charge of ….. I would ……! (complete the sentence)
7.
When I was a child I wanted to become a ……. (complete the sentence)
8.
What is your best talent?
9.
What is your biggest fear?
10. Tell us about a person you admire! 11. When was the last time you cried? 12. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 13. If I could change one thing about myself I would change …. (complete the sentence) 14. What is your biggest achievement? 15. What is your greatest failure?
