West, Edie (1997). 201 Icebreakers: Group Mixers, Warm-Ups, Energizers, and Playful Activities. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Here are some sample techniques from the book.

1) Theme Work: Have everyone number a sheet of paper from one to ten. With a CD player or tape recorder, play brief snippets from TV theme songs as people write down their guesses.

2) Good Sports: to choose groups, make cards with one of 6-9 words on them: football, bobsled, downhill skiing, cross-country skiing, speed skating, tennis, basketball, or figure skating. Keeping their slips hidden, students have to find other members of their group by miming the action without talking.

3) How Quickly They Forget: participants pair off and introduce themselves, then immediately have to turn back to back and fill out a handout with the person’s eye color, hair color, jewelry, name, etc.

4) The Hummer’s Parade. Form groups and give everyone a kazoo (or comb and tissue paper). One person makes a two-minute speech for the group on a class-related topic while the others simultaneously play the same tune in the background.

5) Best and Worst: have students write the best and worst thing that happened to them in the past week (something they don’t mind sharing). Share with the group.

6) Two to Tango: Give each person a slip with names from nursery rhymes (e.g., Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretal) and have students form groups by acting their character and pairing up with others from the same story. The catch is they can’t say their character’s name, but can say things their character might say.

7) Life’s Little Suitcase: have participants find three items in their wallets or purses that they’d be willing toshare with the group. [Variation: put the items on a table, make sure there are no duplicates or valuables, scramble, and have people guess who the items belong to.]