Red shoes

Make a circle sitting on chairs
One person stands in the middle and must say something about themselves.
i.e. "I am wearing red shoes."
Everyone with red shoes must change places without letting the person in the middle sit down.
The person who cannot sit down then becomes the person in the middle.
And so on.

Variation
A condition can be put on the game like, Only share something that happened to you last week, or tell the group something you dislike.
If there is no condition put on the game it is interesting to see how much people disclose about themselves and cit an give you a good indication of the level trust within the group.

Comment: I found this a useful game when working with excluded pupils recently to guage how far they were willing to open up. I also repeated it at the end of the term to see how far they had come.

Sparkle

Stand in a circle and get the group to rub their hands together
Then instruct them to rub different body parts
Ask the group if they can start to feel their hands or finger tips tingling
The idea is to focus this energy into a clap around the circle
As the clap comes to you simply send it on round the circle with as much energy and focus as possible
Give the instruction that the clap can be reversed around the circle
Also the clap can be sent across the circle.

Variations:
Try and play this game with your eyes closed, with the idea to not catch anyone out but rather keep the clap going.
(You will need a pair of eyes open to act as adjudicator)

Gesture Name Game

In a circle ask each person to think of a gesture that represents who they are.
Go around the circle one by one with each person saying their name and showing their gesture.
Go round the circle again and each time after someone shares their name and gesture the whole circle must repeat it together.
This time go round the circle with the whole group doing each persons name and gesture. The person who is having their gesture done must stand still and not show them. (The name can be dropped at this stage if you like - Put it in your pocket)

Progression
You can play a game where someone must show their gesture and then pass it to someone else by doing theirs as well.
That person then does their own gesture and passes it to someone else and so on.
When someone is unable to do this for whatever reason then they must sit out.
The winner is the last person left in.

Group people together who have similar gestures or even gestures that contrast in an interesting way.
This group must present some kind of movement or drama using each of their gestures.
You could also give the group a well known story/nursery rhyme to act out and each of their gesture must be contained within the story.

Comment: I have used this many times and it is an excellent way to get a group to learn each others names and open up to one another. I tried this with a group of ordinands recently and although the group new each other quite well, individuals revealed things about themselves through their gesture that they had never previously shared.
No matter what the person shows always accept their gesture, although at times you may need to reflect it back to them or accentuate something they show you to make it clearer.

Stroboscopic Image

In a group of 4 tell one another a personal story about yourself.
As a group agree on 3 images for each story
The narrator (and author) of the story sits on a chair to the side but cannot speak while the remaining 3 perform the image for each part of their story.
Rehearse the sequence so that moving from one image to the other becomes seamless.
The leader (Joker) instructs the audience to close their eyes whilst the first image is being made and then to open them to view it.
This is repeated for each image

Ask the narrator how they felt whilst their story was being shown?
Ask the audience how they felt watching he story? What was it about?

Find the sound and feel the hand.

Stand in a circle and number the group 1 and 2
1's stand opposite 2 (On their right) and say a noise/rhythmical sound that repeats
The stand opposite the person on your left and do the same.
Each person should now have their own sound and be familiar with the sound of the person on their left and right.
All hold hands in the circle and practise your sound. While you do this examine the hands of the people each side of you.
Everyone is to close their eyes and walk slowly around the room making their noise.
The aim is to find the sounds of the people from each side of you in the circle and get back into the circle as a whole group
You can feel peoples hands to help you with identifying if the sound is not conclusive for you.

Stuck in the Mud

Somebody is it and their job is to tag everybody in the room, which immediately freezes them.
Once someone is tagged they must stand still with their legs a stride.
If someone else is able to crawl through their legs then they are free again.
Once the person on it has managed to freeze everybody then the game is over.

Progressions
To make it a bit harder for the runners you can use two or even three taggers.
You can also make the space smaller to play their game.
If you start with more people on it then you can limit them by making them crawl like crabs

Benefit
This is a great game for getting a group to work together as a team unknowingly and would work as a great warm up if the group had been experiencing division of some kind

Trust run game

The whole group lines up at one end of the room.
One person then faces them on the other side of the room.
That person then closes their eyes and runs to the group stopping when they think they have reached the group.
If it looks like the person is not going to stop in time then the overall leader shouts stop (but several metres from the group).

Nb
It is important that the overall leader does not take part but observes from the side so their complete concentration is on the runner.

It is also good to give the catching group some simple guidelines for stopping someone i.e Hold arms out in front, stand with legs astride and receive the runner into you hands first, with your body weight forward on the front foot. Make sure your head is positioned to the side so your shoulder will take their weight.

Follow up
Ask the group how they felt doing the exercise and whether they surprised themselves or not.

Penguin

Everyone must sit down on a chair spread around the room or space with one chair vacant.
Choose one person to be the penguin. He/she must try to sit in the empty chair, but they are restricted to waddling like a penguin.
They must start from a point furthest away from the empty chair and then start their waddle towards it.
Anybody sitting down can stand up from their chair at anytime and walk normally to sit in the vacant seat and so stop the penguin from sitting down there. However once you stand up from your chair you cannot sit back in it. The aim of the game is to stop the penguin from sitting down
The penguin can sit in any chair that is vacant so you must be careful not to vacate a chair too close to the penguin at any time.
Once the penguin sits down the game is over and a new penguin can be chosen.
The skill of the game is working together as a team, keeping eye contact open at all times.

Leading and following

With a partner label yourselves A and B
A has the job of leading B around the room holding their hand
B must keep their eyes closed at all times
(A Take your time to allow B to build up trust and especially be aware of objects and others in the room).
As B gets more confident you can loosen the grip and perhaps just link a finger with them.
Encourage them to move faster and experiment with levels and turning.
Create moments where you completely release their hand so that they are travelling alone.
(But stay close to them so you are able to stop them or guide them should they be heading in a dangerous position).
A swap roles with B

variation
1 Cars
Another method of leading you partner is from behind by simply touching your partner on the left shoulder to turn left, the right shoulder to turn right and in the centre of the back to stop. This means that if you are not touching your partner then they should move forwards. If you touch them twice in the centre of the back then they must move backwards.

2 Voice
Try leading your partner using your voice, either by reciting something or singing a song.
(The partner is now being lead by sound as opposed to touch.)

Chair revelation

Sit on chairs in a circle
One person stands in the middle
He/She says one true thing about themselves
"I am wearing blue socks" or "I have never been to France" or "I don't like cheese"
Other members must change seats if they share the same truth.
The person in the middle must also try to sit down and whoever is left standing becomes the person in the middle.
You are not allowed to move to an adjacent chair.

Music and Image as a stimulus

Description
In a circle, the leader starts to mime he/she is holding an object and passes it to the next person. Then when we pass the object it changes shape and when you pass it to the next person to you add a sound.

The group are asked to spread around the room and listen to four different tracks (songs) they move to the rhythm of the music in different ways and think about doing something of their daily routine.

Leader: “Ok now all of you are ready to come with me to my specials trips, the only think you need is to know that in this table you can find thousands of items you will need for each trip; you can take a maximum of 3 items for each trip” The leader has a selection of pictures of different places s/he picks one and shows the picture to the group and asks them to prepare the bag for the first trip; when they are ready to go s/he put one of the tracks and explains to them when they hear the music they should imagine themselves in the place and when they hear the music turning down very slowly they should freeze and make a picture. They can talk to each other, they can play any games, or if they want they can be by themselves. After the picture ask each of them to tell you about they journey and the experience.

Rationale
1. Objects: To find different ways to pass and pick up the object also we can see how the people of the group start working as a team, the object can be big and heavy or fragile and long or is a baby. The objective is to stimulate the creativity and trust of the group through changing the shape and adding a sound.

2. Music: Through the music is very easy to engage the attention of the young people, is a good way to stimulate the creativity because they feel the freedom of expression and they want to follow their own internal rhythm.

3. Music and image: This particular exercise helps us to explore creativity and concentration also gives us the chance to share different experiences going back in time and space looking for traditional events or typical activities from the countries where the young people come from.

Guidance
Objects: Nobody is allowed to change the object till it arrives to the leader to start again.

Music: Participants should be encouraged not to dance, only walk, run, talk, jump, or do any movement of their daily routine. If you identify the nationality of the group you may want to try to find music from their country, it will help to create a good atmosphere. The tracks need to be poles apart for example: Tango, Reggae, Classical, and Jazz.

You could give the chance to each member to organise a trip, in that way every time it is more difficult to guess what kind of items they need.