Time Required: 10-15 Minutes Group Size: 10-50 Purpose: Physical energizer, getting to know you 1.

Teach participants the mingle song, which goes, "Mingle, mingle, M I N G L E" (the mingle song is open to interpretation, dance moves may be incorporated depending on the creative mind/ coordination of the facilitator. 2. Explain that while the mingle song is being sung, participants must move about the room. 3. After participants have mingled to the satisfaction of the facilitator, the facilitator will yell out a number, and the participants must then stop mingling and get into groups of that number. For example: After participants have mingled, the facilitator will yell out, "GROUPS OF 3". Participants would then make groups of 3 as quickly as possible. 4. After giving participants about 15 seconds to make groups. The facilitator then yells out 2-4 questions for everyone to ask their group members. The questions should be get-toknow you questions decided by the facilitator. 5. After giving participants adequate time to ask and answer the questions, the facilitator then starts singing the mingle song, everyone should join in and the game starts over. 6. The group size and questions should change throughout the game. For example on the second round, participants may need to get into groups of 5 and they have to answer 2 questions instead of 3. Note: After a round or two, the facilitator should say that participants can't be in a group with more than 1 or 2 people (depending on the size of the group) they have already been in a group with. I would also suggest that if it is a new group, always making one of the questions: What's your name? If you have trouble making up questions off the top of your head, you may want to come prepared with a list of questions.

Material Needed: None Time Required: 10-15 minutes Group Size: 10-20 Purpose: Energizer, just for fun 1. Arrange participants into two equal lines facing each other. 2. Once group turns around while the other gets 30 seconds to change 10 things about them (switch jewelry, change hair style, untie shoelaces, switch watch to other arm, trade clothing, etc.) as long as they are all things in sight. The first group turns back around and must identify the 10 changes. 3. After they identify the changes, or time is up they swap so they other team gets to make changes while they guess.

Material Needed: Writing utensils and quarter sheets of paper

Time Required: 10-25 minutes Group Size: 5-50 Purpose: Physical energizer 1. Pass out paper and writing utensils to the group. 2. The facilitator does not participate. 3. Each participant writes something silly to do on the piece of paper. (i.e. bark like a dog). They then crumple up the paper. 4. The facilitator tells the group to start passing the paper around the circle, then tells them to stop after a given time. 5. The facilitator then picks people to do the action described on the piece of paper. 6. The facilitator can tell as many people as they want to do their silly action. Note: A variation of this would be that the people doing the action could not laugh. If they laugh, they're out and repeat the process until only two people (the winners) are left. Source:

Mumblers
When it comes to communication it's surprising to learn that as little as 7 per cent of a communication's effectiveness can be attributed to words alone with voice quality contributing 38 per cent and 'non verbals' providing the remaining 55 percent. Most people won't believe you when you give them these figures which kind of proves the point so rather than trying to argue the point, try this exercise which is also a great deal of fun. Divide the group into pairs and give one person in each pair a card with a simple task that they should communicate to their partner. Examples of the type of task would be: 'Close the door', 'Open the window', 'Scratch my back' etc. They can communicate with each other any way they like gestures, sounds, tone of voice with the exception that they can't use recognisable words. The exercise finishes when the task has been completed.

Ping

Pong

This exercise randomly selects group members. You will need as many ping pong balls as you have people. Decide in advance how many groups you want and how many people you want to be in each group. Prepare the ping-pong balls by writing a group number on each ball. For example, if you have twelve people who will be working in three groups of four people, then write 1 on four of the balls, 2 on another five balls and 3 on the last five balls. Throw the balls to the participants until everyone has caught or retrieved a ball. Then ask them to work with the people who have the same-numbered balls as themselves.

Snap
The aim of this exercise is to randomly select pairs. Using a graphics program and a selection of clip art, make up a set of duplicate designs or drawings so that you have the same number of 'playing cards' as the number of participants. Deal one card to each member of the group and have them find their partner (who has the duplicate card).

Anagrams
Make up anagrams of the participants' names and either: display as pairs on a flip chart (for finding pre-allocated partners and groups), or use them on name plates (for pre-arranged seating).