1. "Automatic Car Washing" : Two rows of people sitting one against the other, with their knees touching, thus creating something like a tunnel, and each of the group in his turn has to crawl on their knees. While crawling, they all "wash" him with their hands, his ears, his neck, his face, his body, his legs etc. This brings a lot of laughter. 2. "Pass the Ball" : People have to pass a ball or a fruit in the circle without using the palms. This force you to be very creative in awkward movements and body to body touches. 3. "Kissing Game" : People stand in a circle. The first one holds a thick paper in his/her open mouth (the paper is concave, so it covers the open mouth). The goal is to pass the paper from mouth to mouth, like in kissing. This results in a lot of embarrassment, discharged by laughter. 4. "Two-Way Massage" : A circle of people standing face to back and massaging each other's back (so each one is massaging the one before him, while getting massage from the one behind him). Then they change the direction, so each one is getting a massage from the one he previously was massaging. Very funny and very enjoyable. 5. "The Princess Mattress" : All the group lay flat on the floor (on their bellies, or on their back, which is more embarrassing), in a row, thus creating a long "mattress", and the last one rolls over them from one end to the other. When he reaches the end, he lays there, and the next one is doing the same, etc. 6. "Blind Trusting" : People stand in a circle. Each member, in his/her turn, stands within the circle, shuts her eyes, and falls slowly to any direction (while keeping her body straight as a board), trusting her friends not to let her fall. The other people keep their hands to gently stop her from falling and push her lightly to fall towards others. 7. "The Tie / Knot (PLONTER ?)" : People stand in a circle and each of them holds each one of her hands with somebody's else hand, across the circle, thus creating a very complex knot. The goal is to un-plot this complex knot, without leaving the hands you hold. It is permitted to skip over held hands, to turn around, etc. until you gain a simple circle. YES, it is always possible. 8. "Ha, Ha, Ha" : In this game everybody lies on their backs on the floor in a chain, with their heads on each others stomachs and you say in turn ha, ha ha, ha ha ha, each person saying ha one more time than the previous one. People usually end up laughing and laughing. 9. "Body Partners" : I used this game in all men's classes (in prison) recently and we had a very lively discussion about physical closeness and men, afterwards. I hope it works as well for you. For this game there needs to be one person acting as "caller" to start out. It works best with an odd number of people so that the person left without a partner is the "caller" the next time. The "caller" calls out a body part or two body parts - like "knee to knee" or "knee to elbow" and everyone finds a partner and matches up the body parts just called. It's helpful to tell them that they need to find a new partner each time. The person without a partner is the next "caller" and calls out different body parts - "back to back", "foot to hand" etc. It's fast paced because everyone is scrambling to find a partner and lots of fun. Inevitably, but hopefully not too soon, someone calls out something like "stomach to stomach", "nose to nose", or "cheek to cheek" which brings tons of laughter. If no one calls out the more intimate feeling combinations you can always be slow to pair up and be the next "caller" and call them yourself. Here is another variation to the same game : I know one game that uses touch and gets people laughing. It's called people to people. It goes like this, in a circle you get people into pairs and then one person announces two parts of the body and the people have to touch those parts of each other except when you say "elbow/forehead" and they have to touch elbows to forehead. 10. "Couples" : Get people into pairs. Each pair stands one facing the other, in a distance of two arms. Each one puts her arm straight forward, and they lean against each other, palm against palm. Then they increase the distance between them by stepping backwards, while still leaning one against the other, as far as they can. 11. "Couples" : Get people into pairs. Each couple stand touching each other, back to back. Leaning against each other, they change into sitting, and then again stand up, still leaning back to back. Applause Each person takes it in turns to be inside the circle. The rest give applause whatever the person inside does. Alley Cats Two rows, everyone 1 - 2 arm lengths apart, top two are cat and mouse, everyone else arms outstretched. Cat chases mouse down alley(s). When anyone calls "turn" everyone in the lines turns 1/4 turn. When cat catches mice, change roles, next time couple goes to bottom and next couple become cat and mouse. Backs Walk round in a circle, try to get neared to the person in front without making the circle any smaller, when someone calls "backs" try to touch the back of the person in front without being touched yourself. Blind partners Blind walk Blind robot Blind trust Circle chase In pairs, except for 2, one behind the other in a circle with enough space between for people to run in and out of the circle. One of the 2 chases the other. Other is safe if they stand in front of a pair, back person in pair then gets chased. Swap over if chaser catches other. Echoes In pairs, agree on a sound, stand back to back, close eyes and making sound go to the edge of the space, stop moving and making the sound, keeping eyes closed. When everyone has stopped, turn round, with eyes still closed start making sound again and find partner. Fizz Buzz Counting round the circle from 1 to 35 saying fizz for multiples of 5 and buzz for multiples of 7. Start couning again from anyone who gets it wrong. Knee fight In pairs, facing: hand on knee, knee guarded, try to touch one of the other's unguarded knees. Lateral codes Passing crossed/uncrossed Ducky ducky whoops ducky That was easy, 3 Look up, look down In a circle, everyone looks down and starts clapping slowly together. On the second clap everyone looks up at one other person. If any pairs make eye contact they keep looking up and maintaining eye contact for the rest of the game. Everyone else looks down again after the next but one clap, up again after the next but one clap until everyone has eye contact. If odd number, last person gets a treat. Puppets In pairs, facing, a bit apart: puppeteer operates puppet using imaginary strings over a bar. Quick emotions Divide space into four segments: angry, frightened, happy, sad. Group mills around/walks in circle. When someone calls "stop" everyone acts into the emotion of the quadrant they are in. Red ball, yellow ball Throwing two identical balls around the circle. One ball is nominated as red and the other is yellow. Thrower says the colour. Strings Group mills around imagining a string is pulling along each. Anyone can call out which part of the body the string is attached.
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