4: Games to Get You Started

Warmers or ice-breakers, call them what you like, but it’s good to have some activities
up your sleeve that help the class get to know each other and feel relaxed. Here I present
a collection of activities to try on the first day of a new course. Choose one that matches
your students’ level or interests.

Activities to break the ice in class

Try these icebreakers

* Same and Different: Prepare a chart with three columns on the board and ask
students to do the same in their notebooks. Label each column as I show in Figure.
As an example, ask a student if she likes something you like and then ask about
something you dislike. After a few questions like this, record the information on
your chart and then repeat the process with one more student. Then, as a class your
students have to mingle for ten minutes and find out which similarities they share
with classmates, and which differences. They should note the information in the
chart and use it to give you feedback about their classmates when the mingle is
over.

Name Something in Something different

common with me from me

Yu Likes dancing Likes coffee 

Jinnapat Loves eating out Doesn’t like sad
movies

* Name Bingo: For this activity you need to pre-prepare a bingo card but instead of
putting numbers in the squares, write biographical facts or achievements instead.
By mingling with classmates and asking questions, the students race to find
someone whose name they can write in each square because they have
accomplished the activity mentioned or it’s true of them. When they have a name
for each square, they shout ‘Bingo!’

Someone who can Someone who often Someone who has

skateboard well plays basketball two brothers
Someone who Someone who goes Someone who was
speaks Spanish to the cinema two or born in a hot place
three times a month
Someone who Someone who has Someone who
dislikes Maths trained a dog to do thinks hip hop music

1
 something is great
* Describe your team in four words: Divide the students into groups of roughly
equal size. They all have ten minutes to get to know the students in their group and
then find four words that sums the team up.
* A fact in a hat: Ask each student to write one interesting thing about themselves
on a slip of paper, for example I can breakdance. Collect all the slips and mix
them up in a hat. Then each student takes a slip and tries to guess who wrote the
fact that was pulled out. If they draw out their own fact they can just throw it back
in. Allow two or three guesses and ask the person who wrote the fact to tell the
class more about it.
Secretly throw in one fact about yourself so that there is an extra fact present even
when you get down to the last sentence.
* Picture yourself: Each student must draw a quick picture which shows something
about their life. In pairs, students swap pictures and try to guess the meaning of
what they see. The student who drew it should explain and expand. Pairs can swap
pictures and note their guesses about others’ lives before you have a class
feedback to reveal all.
* The big debate: Line all the students up in a sort of queue, facing the front. Then
instruct them that they must move left or right to demonstrate their opinion. So for
example shout Jump to the right if you prefer dogs and jump to the left if you
prefer cats. Next the students standing on the same side confer as a team for two
minutes and try to come up with reasons why their viewpoint is better. Finally, the
class debate whose opinion is better. Declare a winner and move on to another
topic when the debate runs out of steam.
* Get in order: Line students up, and give them a minute to put themselves in order
by asking each other questions. Ordering topics could be their front door numbers,
ages, the number of countries they’ve visited and so on. Ask students questions
yourself to verify that the order is correct. After a few rounds they will have
spoken to everyone and found out a little about them.
* Build it: Divide the students into small teams of different nationalities. Give each
group some ‘building materials’ such as playing cards, cuisenaire rods, newspaper
and tape or Lego blocks. They have five minutes to design the best construction in
order to win a prize (a new pencils or some sweets will do ). The collaboration on
the project and competition with the other team should break the ice pretty
quickly. You can remove a ‘building block’ from the team’s creation if students
speak English while building.