Fast and Easy Get to Know You Games

School's about to start, and yous've got a new course of students. Time for some fun, new 'getting to know you' classroom activities or icebreakers for kids? Back-to-school icebreakers can go a long way in the early weeks of school to help your students feel more than comfortable in the classroom, go to know you, and aid them go to know their classmates!

Whether your schoolhouse shuffles students around from year to yr, you've got a batch of pre-Thou or kindergarten students who are brand-new to attending school, or y'all've got some new kids who merely moved into the district, those showtime twenty-four hours of school and showtime week of school icebreakers will make a big difference in creating a team temper.

What Is an Icebreaker?

If y'all're non familiar with getting to know you lot icebreakers, maybe it's merely because you lot haven't used that term before. They're activities that are fun and built effectually loosening students up, helping them "intermission the ice" so to speak with you lot and other classmates who they might not know very well.

Maybe you've done your own fair share of icebreaker activities in staff meetings or during an orientation? Then y'all know they can assist give people something to talk about and help them quickly build upward a rapport.

Best of all … nosotros've got plenty of fun icebreaker games and activities for kids from pre-school on up to center school!

Icebreaker Games and Activities for Kids

Let'south pause the water ice with some fun activities, shall nosotros?

Find 4 Icebreaker

Find Four is a peachy icebreaker for helping kids go up and become those wiggles out while introducing themselves to their new classmates.

The premise is simple:

Students are given a card broken out into different squares with instructions in each square (You tin print a pre-filled Find Four bill of fare here !).
Each instruction tells them to "find four" classmates who meet dissimilar criteria such as "discover four classmates who have a dog."
It's up to your students to wander the room and ask their peers questions almost themselves to see if they can "find four!"
Students tin can write the names of their "our" in the boxes — a great way to help kids commit new names to memory.

Best for grades: ii through 5

Classmate Scavenger Hunt

Send your students on a scavenger hunt to intermission the ice with their new classmates … only they don't need to find something. They need to notice someone, or rather several someones! Very like to Discover 4, this hunt may be more appropriate for smaller classes where "finding four" might be tough or for younger students.

From someone who has a pet to someone who has blue eyes, this action gets kids up and moving as well as coming together and greeting their classmates.

You tin can print a pre-filled scavenger hunt template hither .

Best for grades: one through three

Name Chase

Remember 'Duck, Duck, Goose'? This icebreaker activity is a twist on the archetype playground game and a great ane to assistance new students retrieve each other's names.

Students sit in a circle with one person, "it", standing on the outside.
The person who is "it" walks around the circumvolve, gently tapping each person on the head, proverb that person's name as they do (instead of saying "duck").
If the person who is "it" taps someone and says the class name instead (e.m. "Ms. Green'due south class" instead of saying "goose"), the tapped person has to stand up and chase "it" effectually the circle trying to tag them before "it" takes their spot.

All-time for grades: Pre-Thousand and upward
kids playing drama games, standing in a circle holding hands

Getting to Know You Fortune Tellers

Whether you call them cootie catchers or fortune tellers, the popular paper flap games are a big hitting in the classroom. But did you always recall to use them equally an icebreaker? Print out the fortune teller template (information technology'southward free!), and fill information technology in with getting to know yous questions such equally "what mean solar day is your birthday?" and "how many siblings do you lot have?"

Photocopy, and distribute to your students, splitting them into groups of two to play "fortune teller" together. They'll have fun seeing if the fortune teller is able to guess the correct answers!

Best for grades: 3 through 6

Two Truths and a Prevarication

This game is a classic (and fairly addictive) icebreaker for kids that tin can be played every bit a whole form or in modest groups.

icebreaker game cards with duck duck goose and two truths and a lie

Each person in the class comes up with iii statements near themselves. Two should exist true statements, and i should be imitation. Depending on the historic period of your students, you might let them to think upwardly the statements and keep them in mind or to do writing them down.
Working your way down the class listing, phone call on students i by one.
When chosen on, each student should announce their three statements for the rest of the class to determine which argument they call up is false.

Some different ways to play this game are:

Have the entire class vote by a prove of easily on which statement they remember is false.
Accept each educatee write downwards which statement they think is false, and see who gets the near correct.

Best for grades : 2 and upwards

Embankment Ball Icebreaker Game

The Beach Ball Icebreaker game is another classic and FUN way for you to get to know your students and for your students to get to know each other!

Employ a permanent marker to write a question on each panel of a accident-upwardly beach ball.
Standing or sitting in a circle, students throw or roll the ball to someone else in the circumvolve.
When students receive the ball, they answer the question that is facing them. Then they pass or roll the ball to someone else.

This game tin be so easily tailored to suit the context of your classroom or the time of yr. You could fix a variety of beach assurance to bring out for brain breaks too (check out six of the Teach Starter teachers' favorite ways to use assurance in the classroom)!

For example, with a new grade, yous may write some more basic getting to know you lot questions such as "What is your favorite affair to do on the weekend?" Returning from a intermission with a class you already know you may write different questions like "If you lot could live anywhere in the world, where would information technology be and why?"

Pentagonal Me

Your students have come back from summer break brimming with stories and updates about their lives. Harness that energy with Pentagonal Me, an icebreaker activity that doubles as a fun mode to introduce geometric shapes.

Print a Pentagon Template that's been broken into 5 separate sections.
Each department directs students to share v facts about themselves in dissimilar subject areas.
Later on the kids have written out their 25 facts, ready your students upwards in groups of 5 (if possible), and have each educatee choose ane section of their pentagon to read out loud to their grouping.
When the group is done, ship students dorsum to their seats, and ask students to share v things they've learned about their classmates.

The filled-out templates also make a cracking display for a Back-To-School Night or Meet the Teacher Night. Parents volition love spotting their child's pentagon on the wall.

All-time for grades : 3 and upwards, only this could be extra fun for 5th graders!

All About Me Cube Games

All About Me Cube template

This hands-on activity can be used in different ways. Download and print enough copies of the All About Me Cube Template for every pupil in your class (and a few spares to go into whatsoever 'new pupil packs' you lot may have prepared for kids to join your class later in the year!). You may decide to enlarge these to tabloid size for extra creative space and to make a fun display.

Here are a few different ways you could use the cubes to turn this craft activity into a group-sharing, icebreaker activity:

#one Cube Clumps

The teacher calls out one of the topics on the cube (e.g. birthday months, hair colour, special places, favorite hobby).
Students find all of the other people in the grade who share that same calendar month, characteristic, or interest and stand in a 'clump'.
For topics that leave students continuing lone (e.g. they are the merely person in their class with that birthday month, characteristic, or interest) utilize this as a way to highlight the amazing diversity and individuality in your grade!

all about me cubes

#2 Cube Mix

Students complete all sides of the cube except for the proper name and self-portrait sides.
Collect the cubes and mix up in a pocketbook or box.
Hand a cube out to each pupil making certain they don't become their own cube.
Students look at the cube they received and see if they can figure out who information technology belongs to.

#3 Cube Stack

In groups, students use the consummate cubes to create 3-D sculptures or displays in your classroom by stacking cubes with the same face out.

The name and birthday side can be used to create a birthday display by stacking all of the cubes from each month together.
Stack the cubes with the portrait side facing out to make a 3-D sculpture.
Use the "special people" or "special places" sides to create a display, or fifty-fifty to use as writing prompts throughout the yr.

Best for grades: 2 through 5

STEM Activities

STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) activities make fantastic icebreakers as they encourage kids to piece of work together and start building a squad mentality. It tin can also accept some of the pressure off shy students who may feel uncomfortable with activities that focus on aspects of themselves and their own lives.

Stem tasks assistance you lot to assess where your new students are at in terms of general noesis and higher-society thinking skill development. Additionally, you will be able to meet how students work in groups which volition help with classroom and behavior direction planning.

Here are some great open-concluded STEM tasks that your students can piece of work on in small groups.

Lower Grade Stem Task Cards

Lower Years STEM challenge task cards

This set of Stem task cards for early grade students contains 22 different challenges that students can complete with ordinarily found and easily sourced materials. From creating the tallest button tower to racing cars without using their hands, these activities are a super fun way to become kids engaging with their new peers.

Upper Grade STEM Task Cards

Build a Raft STEM challenge - free download

You tin download this "Build a Raft" STEM challenge ! Or you check out our STEM Challenge Task Cards for upper grades too.

Heads or Tails

This is an easy icebreaker game to play in the classroom that requires almost no gear up-up! All you need is a pile of pennies and your whiteboard markers!

On your whiteboard, create 2 separate lists with the word "Heads" on top of one and "Tails" on pinnacle of the other.
List One should be a listing of favorites such every bit brute, color, book, etc.
List Two should be "would you rather" questions — would you rather have a dog or cat, consume cereal for breakfast or dinner, etc.
Have your students pair off, and give each pair a penny.
Students in each pair so merchandise off flipping the coin.
If they get a "heads," they have to share an answer from list ane with their partner, working downwardly the list in order.
If they become a "tails," they have to tell their partner their answer to a "would you rather" question from the listing, working down the list in order.

Alternate ways to play:

Instead of writing it all out, choose one of the Would You lot Rather question sets below that are available in Google Slides!

Best for grades: 2 and upwardly

My Memory Matching Game

Some other twist on a familiar classic, this is a bully game for older students. In this game, students create their own cards to play a game of memory with a partner.

Provide students with an fifty-fifty number of bare cardboard squares or rectangles that are all the same colour and size. They will create two retentiveness cards for every fact about themselves (i.e. To create 3 facts every student needs 6 cards. To create 5 facts, each educatee needs ten cards.).
On each pair of cards, students write or describe a fact nearly themselves. Y'all may like to provide students with a listing of prompts to help.
When they have finished creating their 'My Memory' cards, students shuffle their cards with a partner and play a game of memory.
Students can rotate to play with other new partners too.

This Is Me Task Card Game

This icebreaker game is swell for the lower grades, and it makes for a great movement intermission during those early days of school. Download the task cards, and tell your students to stand upwardly nigh their desks or in a circumvolve. If the weather is nice, yous may even want to take the class outside to go some of their wiggles out while the kids get to know i another.

As each carte du jour is read aloud to the students, they respond appropriately if the information applies to them, e.g., leap up and downwardly if you have an older brother. Students will discover that in that location will be many cards that practice apply to them, and many that do not. They simply stand still for those cards that are not applicative and get to know their classmates!

Best for grades: Pre-G and upwards

Wipe That Smile Off Your Face up

Hey, we promised these games were fun, right? Well, this one is FUN, and for fans of the YouTube "try not to laugh" challenges, information technology will be a large hit!

Students sit in a circumvolve and the teacher chooses ane person to get-go the game.
That person smiles their widest, biggest, cheesiest smile at everyone else in the circumvolve, trying to make them express mirth. However, they must be silent, and cannot pull faces or be light-headed, all they tin can do is smile.
For every person in the group who laughs at their smiling, they receive one point.
Subsequently they accept smiled at anybody in the group, they 'wipe' the smile off their face with their hand and 'pass' the grinning to the next person in the circle.

All-time for grades: Pre-yard through 3

Don't forget your Icebreaker Game Cards Download...

Are there more icebreakers for kids, or 'getting to know' y'all games, that yous love playing with your form? Share them in the comments below!

Banner image via Shutterstock/ Andrew Angelov

restivoamithe1951.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.teachstarter.com/us/blog/classroom-getting-to-know-you-icebreaker-games-us/