The Tarp Raft Get everyone to stand around the tarp.

The say, "We have a big announcement, we will now be doing _______ (name of youth group) Cruises! So hop aboard the cruise ship. Please keep in mind that everyone needs to stay on board at all times." Once everyone is on continue with, "Oh no! Weve hit an iceberg and we lost half of the ship. You need to get all of your fellow shipmates safely to the remaining half of the ship, everyone needs to stay onboard at all times or be forever lost to the sea, and there will be no human sacrifices." The team needs to fold the tarp in half and keep everyone on the tarp. This shouldnt be too hard. The say, "Whats that in the distance? Is it a pirate ship? Could it be the Black Pearl and Captain Jack Sparrow? It is! The pirates have fired on our cruise ship and we have lost half of the ship. Make sure to get everyone safely to the remaining half of the ship. Again, everyone must stay on board at all times, and no one can be forced to walk the plank." The team must again fold the tarp in half, keeping everyone on. If someone is lost, keep going, the point is to see how long they can go while working together effectively. "Good, you made it. It should be smooth sailing now uh oh, those sharks look pretty hungry! Darn, a shark has taken a chunk out of our now small boat, and we only have half the ship left. Make sure everyone gets safely to the remaining half. Remember, keep everyone on board, and do not let anyone fall into the shark-infested waters." And again, no sacrifices. If they still are all on, keep going, if not, call it quits. If you want, ask for a breakdown of what worked and what didnt, and what could have been done differently. Finally say, "Phew! Were almost back I can see Palm Walk in the distance! But wait there is a leak and we need to evacuate everyone to one half of the boat to keep it afloat. Quickly and safely evacuate all staff to one half of the ship." This should be the point that people start falling off and the game should be over by now. If not, end it and congratulate them for keeping everyone alive. The Point: No team can do this without full cooperation from every member of the group. They need each other, some for creativity, some for leadership, and some for pure strength and coordination. You can put the focus on

communication or on the fact that everyone in the group has something to offer the entire group.

Alphabet Pockets Divide into teams of 4 or 5. Everyone on the team searches through their own pockets, wallets, pocketbooks, etc. The group tries to come up with one possession which begins with each letter of the alphabet. The winning team is the one to have objects representing the most letters.

Balloon Master Supplies: Duct tape or masking tape and lots of balloons. Divide the group into 2 or more teams with 3-4 people on each team. Give each team a roll of masking tape and 30 balloons. On "Go!" have members of each team roll the masking tape (sticky side out) around one of their teammates below the neckline. Next, have kids blow up their balloons as quickly as they can and stick as many as possible to the taped-up team member. You can either end the game here by awarding the Balloon Master to the one with the most balloons attached in the time allotted, or you can set up an obstacle course and when the balloons have been attached, have the player go through and back to their team. Balloons that fall off during the race cant be re-attached. The team whose player has the most balloons still attached is the Balloon Master.

Blind Square This is a quick, but effective teambuilding activity. Supplies: 1.) As many blindfolds as you have team members 2.) 1 large rope, at least 40 feet in length Simply blindfold all your team members and throw a rope on the ground next to them. Tell them to make a square, using the full length of the rope lying on the ground next to them. Give them no further instructions. There is no trick. Its just great to see who takes charge, how they organize the corners, if one person facilitates from the middle, etc.

Crash This team builder requires some creativity on your part, and a fair bit of preparation. But, its all worth it! Supplies Needed: Blindfolds (1 for every 5 kids you have) Crutches (one crutch for every 5 kids you have) Wooden dowel rods, or equivalent (3 for every 5 kids you have) Lots of duct tape Lead your kids to a location that is a fair distance away from the camp or church. A half mile away is a good enough distance. Have them sit down together as though they were on an airplane. In great detail, inform them that they were on a trip to a missionary project in Africa when their plane went down. Along with several passengers, the pilots were killed, and the radio equipment was damaged in the crash. In short, they are stranded and have no way of contacting others. It gets worse. Not everybody survived the plane crash without injury. At this point, have adult leaders walk around and assign injuries to the group of students. Some students will have a broken arm. (That student needs to have a dowel rod taped to his arm so that he CANNOT use/bend it.) Others students will have a broken leg. (Handicap his/her leg the same way.) Some students might have lost their vision; give them a blindfold to wear. Some students sustained an injury to their mouths and cant speak. (A simple piece of tape across their lips will suffice.) Maybe a few students are totally paralyzed. Some students will get NO injury assigned to them. Use your imagination, but remember to leave a few kids unhurt. Tell them the objective is to get the ENTIRE group back to the church or camp...in one trip. If you want, you can even assign a time limit. (If you have a really large group, you may want to break them into a couple of groups. If you group is smaller, you can just keep them all together.) When you get back to the church or camp, you may want to talk about the experience. Ask some of the students who were handicapped, What was it like to be injured? Ask everyone, Were you able to contribute? If so, how? Ask everyone about the attitude of the group. How were the attitudes on the way back? What does this teach us about teamwork?

NOTES: 1. This would be very difficult to pull off in a city environment. (It may freak out drivers to look out their window and see tons of bandaged up, blindfolded, and wounded teenagers hobbling down the sidewalk. So get into an environment where you can pull the team builder off without any outside interruption. 2. Make sure to have all of your necessary supplies located at the site of the crash so you can quickly get the students into character. 3. Do a good job telling your story. This helps them understand why they cant use cell phones to call for help, or just send somebody for help.

Desert Survivor A Group Decision Making Exercise on Resource Management 11 items: map of desert
salt tablets parachute rain coats mirror compass book (edible plants of the desert) flashlight pistol (loaded) canteen of water hunting knife

You have been a passenger on a plane that has crashed in the desert. These are the items that you have retrieved from the plane before it burned up. The pilot and copilot have been killed and the only survivors are the people in your group. On a scale of 1-11, number these in the order of importance to survival. Give the following instructions to each group:
Work individually for a few minutes

 Appoint a chair person to facilitate the process Decide as a group on the correct survival order

NASA uses this group decision-making exercise with the Astronauts. THE POINT: as your group starts to discuss, they'll find out that the priorities vary depending on the GOAL, or PURPOSE they come up with. For example, the biggest issue is, are they going to stay by the plane (air force pilots, unless in enemy territory and in danger are told to stay with the plane) or leave. If they are going to stay, then the compass and map aren't much of a priority. YOU NEED TO ESTABLISH THE FRAME in which every other decision is made or discussion is useless.

Encouraging Yarn This team builder is a little different than the rest of the ones on our site. There is no pit of crocodiles to cross over, and no burning buildings to evacuate. Just some good ol team building at the hearts level. Heres what you do. If you have a group of more than 30 students, break them in half, otherwise, just seat them in a circle facing one another. (Adult leaders can, and should, be included in this!) Hand one person a ball of yarn and tell him to throw/roll it to someone else. When the other person catches it, the thrower says something to that person that is encouraging in nature. (You are a loyal friend. You give grace to others. You are a helpful person. Etc.) Afterwards, the person who was just encouraged grabs the yarn in one hand and tosses the ball of yarn to another person with the other hand. She then tells that person an encouraging point about his/her nature. This process repeats until a spider web has been created between the students in the circle. (By the way, the same person can be encouraged more than once by more than one person.) The group needs to be real and genuine with each other. They can have fun while doing this, but they need to be serious when they pass on encouragement to others. Be watchful of new kids that very few people know. You may want to privately call on an adult leader or a great inner circle student to focus on him or her.

Also, dont let the encouragements boil down to simple compliments (I like the way you dress.) Force them to reach for deeper meaning behind a person, their nature, or their actions. For instance, I appreciate the fact that you do not dress in a provocative way. Or I am glad you no longer wear shirts with mean or ungodly messages on them. When everyone has had at least one turn, you can have a discussion about this while everyone holds onto their string (maintaining the spider web). Possible Questions: What does this tell us about the community that we have in our youth ministry? How did this make you feel? Do you feel that the people around you spoke the truth about you? How important are we to one another? Did you learn something about someone else? If so, what? When the discussion dies down, take a pair of scissors and cut a few connections between students and discuss the effect it has on the group. NOTE: Make sure only one person is talking during this exercise from start to finish! Side conversations make the exercise last too long and do not give everyone a few seconds of special encouragement. Land Mines Supplies: Blindfolds, water balloons for outside, Styrofoam cups for inside. Set up a "mine field" by randomly placing the water balloons (or cups) on a marked section of ground. A concrete slab or basketball court works well for this. Grass also works, but you will need to set boundaries. Divide students into groups of about 4 or 5. Give each team a blindfold. Put the blindfolds on one member of each team. The point of the exercise is for the ENTIRE team to get across the mine field with the fewest casualties, the fastest. If a person TOUCHES a mine he/she is out (if it bursts water on them, it just makes it more fun). The other team members must be their eyes and tell them which way to go. The blindfolded people crossing the field must stay within the set boundaries, and only one person per team may be on the mine field at a time (so they can't lead them by touch). Team members help each other by shouting directions. Works best if mines are close together and if teams are close together. Adult leaders may yell out random directions to try to throw the teams off. The trick is (don't tell the kids this till after it's over) for the person in the mine field to

pick out a certain voice and listen to that one voice. The Point: We need to listen to God's voice instead of all the voices that the world throws at us.

Hula Hoop Pass Supplies: Hula Hoops for every team you have. Get all your participants in a circle holding each other's hands. Get someone to 'unlock' one of their hands from the circle, put a hula-hoop onto his/her hand, then reconnect with the circle. The aim of this game is to get the hula-hoop around the circle and back to where it started without the group letting go of each other's hands. Can also be played with groups against each other and a stop watch; lots of fun!

ICEBREAKERS

Appointment Clock Create a clock with hands to each of the twelve hours. Give a copy of this clock and a pen/pencil to every student in the group. The hands of the clock act as blanks for the students to write each other's names on. Everyone goes around and has to 'make an appointment' with someone who has an opening at the same 'time' you do on your card. You go around till you fill out all 12 spots with names. After everyone is done the leader says, 'Ok, it's 3 p.m., time to find the person you made an appointment with." They find this person and then have to answer a goofy question and a serious question, both provided by the youth leader. Example of Goofy Qs What is your favorite restaurant? What is your MySpace? What was your most embarrassing moment? What is your favorite food? Example of Serious Qs What is your biggest fear? What is your favorite Bible story? If you could meet one person in human history, who would it be? If there was one thing you could change about your friends, what would it be?