You struck a chord with me on this thread. I am a former orientation leader, and a current fanatic lover of ice-breakers/team builders/energizers. Here are a few of my favorites:
1.
Links - In this ice-breaker you will need one person to lead the group and explain the game.
The person who is the team leader is going to start off the game by stating random facts about himself/herself. They should be saying things like, "I play the violin, I am a legacy to XYZ, and I played volleyball in highschool" until he/she says something that someone else in the group has in common.
When someone hears something that they have in common with the group leader; that person walks up to the person talking and links arms with them, and at this point they begin to talk about themselves (the same thing the leader did).
The activity repeats until the very last person says something that the person who started the exercise has in common with them, and then they link arms creating a circle.
At this point the whole group will be linked together forming a giant chain. You can point out how, despite the fact that almost everyone walked in as a stranger, you all are connected in one way or another.
**My chapter did this exercise, during a time of strife within our organization, at a brotherhood retreat a while back. Instead of talking about ourselves though we talked about our dreams for our Fraternity (linking arms when you share a dream with another brother). I know it seems a little gay, but it actually helped us prioritize our goals as a Chapter over our petty arguments.
2.
Lost at Sea - This one might not be that fun for girls, but it is still one of my favorites. I can't explain it as well as the website can:
http://dsa.csupomona.edu/osl/studentmanual/files/Lost_At_Sea_327.pdf
But basically you split the group up into smaller groups and you try to solve the problem. It's a lot of fun, and it's really interesting to see how people answer it.
**Google actually used to do this exercise during their interview process. It really is a good way to see people's decision making process.
3.
The Human Sandwich Board - I work for my campus activities board, and we use a lot of sandwich boards to promote our events, so I'm a big fan of this one. It's very simple. You tie two pieces of poster board together with yarn, and then you pair people up in twos.
Each pair is instructed that they have to create an "ad" for the other person using the sandwich board as their canvas. At the end everyone puts on their sandwich board and the artist explains why they drew what they did.
**It might sound pretty simplistic, but it actually allows for a lot of creativity and personalization. You can also really quickly identify which PNMs have artistic ability quickly.
Let me know if any of these help.
Hybrid Mode
