Are you in youth ministry and you've had it with crazed parents? Rollin' your eyes at the pastoral council? Tired of administration work? Love youth? Love the Church? Appalled at parish politics? Looking for some good games? For a creative ways to teach a lesson for Religious Ed? Just need a place to veg out and say "phew! Someone outside of the parish to talk to!"? Grab y'r Starbucks, turn the computer away from the staff's eyes, grab a seat on a donated dusty couch and let it all go.
Hey, what are some good Confirmation Retreat Ice Breakers? Some good folks in Eaton Rapids MI are looking. Ok, that would be my sister. Give it up for the sistaH!!!!
Labels: ice breakers
posted by TCYM Lounge @ 5:43 PM
Are you in youth ministry and you've had it with crazed parents? Rollin' your eyes at the pastoral council? Tired of administration work? Love youth? Love the Church? Appalled at parish politics? Looking for some good games? For a creative ways to teach a lesson for Religious Ed? Just need a place to veg out and say "phew! Someone outside of the parish to talk to!"? Grab y'r Starbucks, turn the computer away from the staff's eyes, grab a seat on a donated dusty couch and let it all go.
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Please pray for the confirmation of Our Lady of America and for the success of Our Lady The Immaculate Virgin. Please go to www.oltiv.org and learn what Our Lady has requested of the youth in order to change the world.
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Not knowing the dynamics of the group; size, familiarity with each other, familiarity with the group leaders make it a little hard to suggest icebreakers but here are two that worked well for us for Confirmation. One goes well with the Corinthians reading 12:12-30. It's called the "Body Eats Breakfast" we used chocolate pudding. It invoves a group of six, where each person has a specific responsibility, and only one responsibilty to the body.All the parts are blindfolded except the eyes. The eyes can talk to the ears only, the ears can only whisper to the mouth. The mouth is the only one who can speak directions to the right and left arms and legs. The group must move across the space to a cup of pudding, open it, and feed it to the mouth.The people who are the right and left arm can only use their right and or left arm. openng the container of pudding can be very amusing here.
It did not turn out to be as messy as it might sound. The young people did a good job when reminded/encouraged to just use their gift toward the benefit of the body and the lesson is great. It led to great discussion about everyone's contributions.
The second icebreaker is done in a room that has been divided into four quadrants with tape. So, it would be a rectangle with cross in the middle. The group is divided into four teams. Each quadrant has equal amounts of an object that can be easily blown in it. (balloons, cotton balls, ping pong balls, something like that) The game starts and each group tries to blow the items into the other teams squares. The object is to get and keep all items out of your square.
It's hard to explain with out the benefit of diagrams but I hope that is helpful in some way.
-cammie
Not sure if this will help but here it goes. We just finished our first Confirmation retreat this weekend and the one icebreaker that the kids kept asking to play was "Do You Love Your neighbor". It is done by getting everybody but 1 person into a circle. Everybody in the circle has a chair to sit in. The person in the middle of the circle then says, "Hi, my name is (Blank)!". Everyone else responds to that by saying, "Hi (Blank)! Do you love your neighbor?". The person in the middle will then respond to that by saying, "Yes, everyone except for those that (blank)." Some typical responses are: those wearing white shirt, those wearing tennis shoes, etc. (They get really creative after a while). At this time all the kids that fit the desription have to get up and find a new chair (they can not go back to the chair they left), including the person in the middle. This will leave one person in the middle and then they get to go through the process. This is a really good one to start with especially if there are a lot of kids that do not know each other. Some things to consider: Try to get the kids to pick things that are general (the more kids moving the more fun it is to watch). Keep an eye out because they do get a little rough trying to get the last chair. Explain they can not just move over one chair. We did this to start our retreat and they had a blast. They kept asking to play it again for the whole retreat (which we did later on to fill in time that we had). Hope this helps...
David P
I was in charge of the ice breaker for my church's confirmation retreat last year and I played this game. It worked out alright. We all stood in a circle with one person in the middle (start with the leader). This person has to walk up to anyone in the circle and say, "Honey do you love me?" in as goofy a manner as possible. They can make funny facial expressions, voices or goofy body movements. The other person has to then respond, "Honey I love you but I just can't smile." If the person standing in the circle smiles or laughs then they have to switch with the person in the middle and they then have to go try to make someone else smile. If the person in the circle doesn't laugh then the person in the middle must keep going. The pros in this game is that everyone is laughing and relaxed and it only takes a few individuals to get the entire group going. The con is that not everyone will be able to get a turn unless the game goes on for a long time.
I will offer a favorite that is surprisingly effective, and will work in conjunction with a game. As each person is introduced they simply add, "Ask me about my.." This must be something personal. Ie: My new care; My golden duddle; My artwork. This works well with strangers as it give "introverts" a safe subject to talk about with each other.
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