Gotchya! (Grab the Finger or Cheese)
Handy icebreaker and attention-grabber for kids thru corporate group programs.
Stimulating group activity to get people together, focused, challenged, having fun and ready for action. Useful to get focused attention when people arrive, get off the bus, or to fill 5-10 minutes.
Works with any size groups, indoor and outdoor.
Participants stand in a circle, arms out to the side. Left hand palm up, right index finger pointing down and touching on neighbor's outstretched palm.
"When I say the word go, do two things.... grab the finger in your left hand, and prevent your right finger from being grabbed... 1 ... 2 ... 3 ... [add suspense] ... Go!".
Repeat several times.
Tom Leahy advises "put big energy, and your own style to it...it never fails to grab everyone's attention, bringing them immediately to the present...Provides perfect off the bus spark for the day....Good for 10 minutes".
The trick is dramatizing the "Go!", the build up of suspense, and most will jump the gun, adding to the fun.
Try a different trigger word, e.g., "Cheese", and mention lots of other "eeze" words for humor - peas, sneeze, wheeze, please and freeze.
Or use the word/theme of the day e.g., "outdoor" to help get people listening to every word.
Can transition to talking about "assumptions" and "temptation", etc.
frozen Tshirt
For each team you'll need one T- shirt and one plastic storage bag.
Place one nicely folded T-shirt in each bag then pour in about 2 cups
of water and freeze all of them overnight. If this wasn't done where
the event is taking place bring the T-shirt in a cooler filled with ice
to keep them frozen. Instruct the teams that they'll be playing an Ice
Breaker game. Then hand out the bagged T-shirts to each team. On "Go"
the teams will have to get their T-shirts thawed out so that one person
from their team can put the T-shirt on. Teams will get creative in their
attempts to win. They could run the shirts underwater, put them in the
microwave and even pounded the ice out of them. The first team to come
back with one person in the T-shirt is the winner.
Ha Ha
Teams competing lay down side by side on floor or ground.
The first person lays back of hand on next persons stomach
and that person lays back of hand on the stomach of the next
to him and so on. The first person in line is to laugh one HA.
The next person in line is to laugh HA HA (two times). The
third person is HA HA HA. And so on. Any person that breaks
out into a giggle is out of the game and must get up and the
hole is filled in. The last one to giggle, wins.