Crossed/Uncrossed
Equipment:
Scissors
Description: The players sit in
a circle on the floor. The leader hands a pair of scissors
(preferably children’s safety scissors) to the person
on his left and says “Crossed” or “Uncrossed”.
The leader should make a point of showing whether the scissors
are being passed to the next person closed or open (ie,
in a cross shape), but shouldn’t actually say anything
about this. Each person passes the scissors to the next
person, announcing either “Crossed” or “Uncrossed”,
and the leader either confirms the announcement (eg, “Yes,
that was crossed.”), or corrects the player (eg, “No,
that was really uncrossed.”).
In this case, “The Secret” is that the words “Crossed”
or “Uncrossed” do not refer to the way the scissors
are held, but rather, they refer to whether the legs of
the player passing thescissors were crossed or uncrossed
at the time.
Notes: If you want to make it really
difficult, “Crossed” or “Uncrossed”
can refer to the legs of the player receiving the scissors,
or can refer to the leader’s legs
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Chinese Whispers
Equipment:
None
Description: The players (either
arranged in teams or one large team) sit in a circle or
straight line. A message is whispered to the first person,
who must whisper it to the next person. This continues until
the last person receives the message, they stand up and
call out the message as they received it. The aim is to
see if the original message survived the trip or if it was
corrupted along the way. Only one attempt at passing the
message is allowed, no repeating
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Ducky Wucky
Equipment:
None
Description: One player is chosen
to be It. It will approach another player and say “Ducky
Wucky”, and the other player must respond “Quack
Quack” without smiling. If the target smiles, then
they become the new It. Make sure that after a few seconds,
It moves on to another target rather than waiting for the
first target to crack. Other than that, It is free to use
whatever vocal inflections, facial expressions, physical
gestures, etc. he wants, as long as
the only thing they say is “Ducky Wucky”
Variations: Telephone - One player
is blindfolded and faces away from the others. One of the
other players is chosen to step up behind the blindfolded
player and imitate the sound of a telephone. The blindfolded
player must try to guess who made the noise. If successful
they swap places.
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Fortunately,
unfortunately
Equipment:
none
Description: One player begins
by saying something like: "We went to camp last week...".
The next player must then say something beginning with Unfortunately
such as "Unfortunately, we forgot our tents".
The next player continues with a statement beginning with
Fortunately such as "Fortuntely, one of us had a large
waterproof groundsheet which we used as a tent". This
continues around the group alternating between unforuntaely
and fortunately.
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Heads Down, Thumbs
Up
Equipment:
None
Description: 5 Players are selected
to stand apart. The remainder kneel with their heads down
and thumbs up. The 5 then select someone and (gently) pinch
their thumbs and return to stand apart. Then those that
were pinched stand up and try to guess who pinched them.
If they guess correctly they swap places with that person.
Play for a certain length of time
Notes: No looking!
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Instant Story
Equipment:
None
Description: Players sit in a circle
and one player leaves the room. The others are going to
pretend to make up a story. The player will come back in,
stand in the middle and ask questions to work out what the
story is going to be. In actual fact once the player has
left the room the leader explains this to the rest of the
players. They will listen carefully to the question asked.
If it ends in a voewl they answer yes and if it ends in
a consonant they answer no, regardless of what the question
is. This will create a bizarre story and confuse the player
in the middle.
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I Went to Camp
Equipment:
None
Description: The players sit round
in a circle. The leader will begin the game by saying something
like, “I went to camp and I took an Axe”. The
next player along then has to choose an item and say “I
went to camp and I took a [whatever they choose]”.
The leader then will tell them that they can or cannot come
to camp. Play continues for a set time or until everyone
knows the secret. In this case, “The Secret” is
that the item the player is going to bring has to begin
with the same letter as their name, otherwise they cannot
come to camp.
Variations: The secret could be
made more difficult. For example, the first letter of the
name of the person sitting to your left and so on
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Noughts and Crosses
Equipment:
Chairs
Description: Chairs are arranged
to form a 3×3 ‘noughts and crosses’ board.
The players are arranged into two teams. The leader asks
the first player from a team a question. If that person
answers correctly they may go and sit on a vacant chair.
Play then switches to the other team, and again the first
person in line is asked a question. The aim of the game
is to get three players in a straight line (horizontal,
vertical or diagonal). When a line is scored, that team
score a point and play is resumed from scratch. Play until
a set time or points limit. Highest scoring team wins
Notes: For a longer, tougher game,
play on a larger board
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Searchlight
Equipment:Torch, 'Darkness'
Description: A person is blindfolded
and put on a chair at one end of the hall. The remaining
players sit quietly at the other end. The lights are turned
off or lowered to allow a certain level of darkness. Selected
players (by touch on shoulder) then attempt to quietly make
their way to grab the keys and return without getting caught.
The person with the ‘searchlight’ attempts to
catch the players in the beam of the torch. He is only allowed
to switch the torch on/off quickly in one position, he is
not allowed to turn the torch on and swing it round (too
simple). Any person caught in the searchlight must stop
and sit quietly. If someone manages to escape with the keys
he swaps places with the searchlight
Notes: Absolute quiet is needed
for the game to work properly
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Story Objects
Equipment:
One object per player
Description: The players sit in
a circle and are given an object to hold (this could be
anything). The leader starts by making up a story which
must include the object they are holding. The leader then
chooses a player at random who must continue the story in
a logical way. They must include the object they are holding
in the story. This continues until every player has had
a turn and the leader finishes the story including their
object in it.
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Silent Writing
Equipment:
Sheet of newspaper
Description: Players stand in a
line with a leader for each team. The leader draws a letter
with his finger on the back of the first player. This player
then passes on the letter to the next player in the same
way. Then the leader draws a second letter and so on to
form a simple word. When all the letters have been sent
see which team can identify the word.
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Swamp
Equipment:
Pen and Paper
Description: Diivide the group
into teams of 4 to 6. Give each team a large piece of paper
and a pen. Each letter in the word SWAMP stands for another
word that describes something in nature:
S Stars
W Weather
A Animals
M Minerals
P Plants
On ‘Go’, each team writes down as many words as
it can think of that relate to the words STARS. The only
stipulation is this: They must be able to see what they
write down from where they are sitting (e.g., sky is where
stars are seen; clouds cover stars on a dull night). Each
team has five minutes to write down as many words as possible.
The next five minutes are devoted to the word WEATHER, the
next five to ANIMALS and so on until all letters of the
word SWAMP havebeen given equal time.
At the end of the writing session, the leader tallies the
number of words to see which team has the sharpest eyes,
and the most vivid imagination
Notes: Some teams may have to explain
their rationale behind writing down certain words - the
leader may not understand how they relate to the ‘master’
word
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Thief
Equipment:
An 'object'
Description: The players sit in
a circle with one person blindfolded in the middle. An object
is placed under the middle chair (or by the middle person).
The blindfolded person has a limited number of ‘points’
to use (e.g. 10). In silence, a selected thief has to quietly
make his way round the circle and then attempt to steal
the object. If the blindfolded person manages to ‘point’
him out (directly point at him) he is caught and play restarts.
If he manages to steal the object he swaps places with the
person in the middle.
Notes: Absolute silence is required
for this game to work properly.
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Time
Equipment:
Watch
Description: Players sit in small
circles of four with their hands behind their backs. The
leader calls out 'Start' and the first player in each group
must estimate a time of 30 seconds. Then they say 'Now'
to the next player who estimates another 30 seconds and
so on. The team which estimates the two minutes the most
accurately wins
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What am I?
Equipment:
None
Description: The players sit in
a circle. One player goes outside the room and the others
decide what that player will be (e.g. a postman) when they
come back. When the player returns and stands in the middle
each player in the circle will mention something they will
need for their job (e.g. a bike, good shoes, van...). If
the person in the middle manages to go all the way around
the circle without guessing what they are they must go out
again. If they guess correctly another player goes out.
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That Reminds Me
Equipment:None
Description: The players sit in
a circle on the floor. The leader begins by naming something.
The next player along must say what that object reminds
them of. This continues round the circle with a connection
each time back to the leader. Then the players must work
backwards, each player trying to remember what they said.
Notes: No repeating connections
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