Archive for the ‘Training Ice Breakers’ Category

An interesting way to start a leadership program with delegates who don't know each other would be to run an ice breaker game to help people get to know each other quickly and spark a few discussions. Try to find an ice breaker that has a leadership theme as a lead-in to the topic of the day. The following leadership ice breaker idea would serve to generate enthusiasm and opinions about the topic:

You will need to prepare beforehand a set of speeches from world class leaders. This can be easily done on the internet. You will need a speech and the name of the famous leader.

When your group have assembled give each one a few lines of the speech and another the name of the leader. Ask people to mingle and find the person with whom the speech matches. Once they have paired up famous leader and famous speech they should spend a few minutes sharing a bit about themselves to each other and their thoughts on this particular leader.

When everyone has paired up ask the group to come back together and then ask pairs to introduce each other. Ask them to read out a few lines of the speech and see if anyone else can guess who the leader is. Once the leader is identifed by the rest of the group the pair can then share a few thoughts on the leadership style of the leader. Carry on around the circle.

• This exercise can be quite difficult unless well know leaders and speeches are picked.
• The ice breaker can be quite lengthy with discussions of various leaders. With this in mind it's a great lead-in to leadership styles. However if this is not required at this moment in time you can omit this stage or keep it brief.

Martin Luther King

"I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood."

Queen Elizabeth I

"I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman; butI have the heart and stomach of a king"

George Washington

"A passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils."

Charles de Gaulle

"The flame of French resistance must not and shall not die"

John F Kennedy

"Ask not what your country can do  for you; ask what you can do for your country"

Nelson Mandela

"I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which i hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is aAn ideal for which I am prepared to die"

Ronald Reagan

"Mr Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall"

Barack Obama

"America is a place where all things are possible"

My small business course at Swansea University finally came to an end just recently....great shame because I was really enjoying it! Fantastic to share ideas and working practises with other small businesses. Well at least my parents finally get to have a graduation photo of me on their wall after all this time. I didn't attend my graduation ceremony first time round - instead I worked as a camp counsellor in America and for many years there has been a hole on the wall with 3 sisters in cap and gown and me on a horse!

Getting back to the course, it ended with a really nice training course closer. We were asked to think back over our time on the course and plot it as a journey on paper with colourful crayons and markers. Quite a few people were immediately horrified at the prospect of creating a peice of artwork for public humiliation, especially as quite a few masterpieces from previous groups were shown, supposedly to give us an idea but only served to highlight our inadequacies. So large sheets of paper and pens were handed out and we were given about 20 minutes to get creative. A few people looked dumbfounded but most got on with it.

"Think about your goals; your highs and lows; any significant achievements or milestones and record your journey pictorially" they said.

After time was up each person in turn took it upon themselves to deliver their journeys to the rest of us. It might sound corny but it was a really neat way to share how the program had impacted upon us all and to say goodbye.

This training course closer is an excellent way of ending the program and can be used by many groups and teams whose time together has come to an end. Sharon Naylor is passionate about learning and

development and she has developed a repertoire of ice breaker games and team building activities that can be used for many groups. Check out her ice breaker ideas website for tons of excellent ideas to make your training programs and social gatherings sizzle!

As trainers we're often looking for novel training games, energizers and ice breakers to elevate our training programmes from dull to dynamic. training games that neatly illustrate a concept such as communication or leadership are trainer's gold dust! Most trainers have a few of these up their sleeves.

If your training session ends with a goal setting session, here's a really easy and effective training closer idea you can use to make the goal setting stick.

Give each person a postcard and then get them to write it to themselves, recording goals and anything significant learnt. Once the postcards have been filled out, take them and post them to the delegates in 6 months time. It's a very handy reminder of goals set and will be a very nice surprise in 6 months time.

Sharon Naylor has tons more training games, ice breakers and energisers up her sleeves. Check out the ice breaker ideas website for hundreds of novel ideas for elevating your training programmes and making them a fun as well as a learning experience. Her blog details new training games and ice breakers every week. Be sure to check it out!

An easy and really quick ice breaker for new groups of 8 upwards is called "Pairs". You will need a set of 8 or more objects (one for each person) that can be paired together or prepare a printed version with pictures. For example you could use:

• knife and fork
• cat and mouse
• paper and pen
• candle and match
• nut and nutcracker
• dustpan and brush
• stamp and letter
• salt and pepper
• shoe and sock
• padlock and key
• brush and comb

Distribute the items and ask people to find their partner. If you can place the objects in a bag or cover, it acts as a bit more of a surprise. Once people have found their partners allow a few minutes for each person to introduce themselves to the other. Bring everyone back to the circle and then ask each partner to introduce the other person to the group.

Sharon Naylor is passionate about ice breaker games for elevating meetings, training and events; turning "boring" into "extraordinary" and really getting people mixing and having fun. Check-out her web-site for more fabulous ice breaker games and ideas to instantly download.

 Start off your meeting or training session with a fun, experiential team activity and your team will be firing on all cylinders right from the word "go"! Dynamic and participative, we strongly believe in the experiential element of getting teams to have a go together at something fun together. They can be used for:

• Breaking the ice at the start of a session
• Breaking down barriers between individuals
• Creative problem-solving
• Illustrating a training point
• Creating team dynamics
• Providing an opportunity to review the way teams work
• To give feedback on team roles
• Low-cost exercises for when budgets are tight
• Ice breakers for conferences and both small and large events
• Kids love them too!

However you use these fun team activities you will find that they can have a real impact on your event. We have used them on all our team building events for over 20 years. In tough times they are also extrememly economical; you can run these team activites yourself without having to employ expensive outsiders! Check out the ice breaker ideas web-site for more on the sticky rope team activity and for ice breaker and training ideas to sky rocket your events!

A great little ice breaker game to start a training session or meeting is "How I See  Myself". This ice breaker is particularly good for getting to know each other's strengths and weaknesses and see how others view them.

Ask participants to bring their chairs into a circle and simply hand out a blank postcard to each person. Ask each person to write down 5 adjectives that describe themselves; 3 should be strengths and 2 should be perceived weaknesses. So i might write: enthusiastic, imaginative, creative, impatient and intolerant. Put all the cards into a hat, basket or recepticle and mix up.

Walk around the circle with the hat and get each person to pick a card (hopefully it won't be their own; if it is, they will have to put back and take another). Go around the circle and in turn read out the card - that person then has to guess who the card belongs to.

When the ice breaker game is finished, find out who was easy to guess and who wasn't and why?

A great variation would be to pull names out of a hat and write 5 adjectives for that person, put them back into the hat and repeat the above process. How accurate would the 5 word descriptions. If it was easy to guess you'll know it's a fairly accurate view of how people see you.

Sharon Naylor is passionate about ice breaker games and uses them extensively to kickstart training sessions, group meetings and team building. For more fantastic training ice breakers and ideas to instantly download and transform your events visit the ice breaker ideas web-site.