8 Icebreaker Games for the Elementary Classroom

As teachers, we know that the beginning of the school year flies by, but we need to make sure that we start it off on the right foot by getting to know our students!

Learning more about the entire class during the first week of school is important for building a strong classroom community that continues to grow all the way up to the last day of school. While you want to make sure to get those clear expectations and routines in place so that the rest of the school year can go smoothly, it is crucial to take the time to get to know more about each of your students. This means more than just learning each student’s name and diving deeper into knowing more about them as a person. From their favorite things to an unknown fun fact and everything in between, having the whole class participate in icebreaker games not only helps you learn more about them, but is a fun way for them to learn more about their new classmates.

BONUS: taking the time at the beginning of the year to do this also helps with classroom management because it allows you to start building strong relationships with your students starting on the first day of school.

Here are some icebreaker activities that you can utilize to get the new school year started!

#1: Play a Name Game

This is a great icebreaker activity that allows you to learn the names of your students! Some of the students in your class may already know each other, but if there are new students this is great for helping them become acquainted to their new school and to even make new friends!

One ice breaker game you can play on first day of school is “Favorite Things Name Game”. All you will need is index cards. This is a great game for following directions, too, so you may want to play this with older students. 

TIP: it is best if you model how to write on the index cards by drawing one on the board and completing the steps as you explain them! 

This is a whole group activity, so make sure that you remind students that they do not have to say their name out loud if they do not feel comfortable doing so. Reassuring the class of this helps your students that are non-verbal, or even shy students, feel safe too. You could always have them write what they would say on a whiteboard that they can hold up or even say it for them so that they are still included!

How to play:

ROUND 1 

Start by passing out an index card to each student. At the bottom, have the students write their first name (don’t forget to model this on the board). Once every student has their first name written on their index cards, get the whole class into a large circle. Explain to the class that each person will start by saying “Hello my name is…”, in which everyone responds with “Hello [insert name here]!” for each round. 

So, for example, you would start by saying “Hello my name is Mrs. Moe”, and then the class would say “Hello Mrs. Moe!”. Have the next person in the circle say “Hello my name is [insert name here]”. Continue going around the circle and having each student repeat this step with their own name.

ROUND 2

Now, have students write their favorite food on the line ABOVE their name on the index cards. Once they are done, have them return to the circle. For this round, everyone will say their favorite food AND their name when they say hello. So, it would look like this: “Hello my name is french fries Mrs. Moe”, in which everyone would reply “Hello french fries Mrs. Moe!”. Repeat this step until each person in the circle has said their favorite food and their first name.

ROUND 3 

Next, students will write their favorite color ABOVE their favorite food. Again, they will return to the circle once they are done writing to get ready for this round. As in previous rounds, everyone will be saying their favorite color, favorite food, and then their name, in that exact order. 

This would be a great opportunity to allow someone else to start the round off, now that they have had two rounds of your modeling, just remind them to read their favorites from top to bottom of their notecard and start with “hello my name is”. (How this round would look: “Hello my name is blue french fries Mrs. Moe!”, “Hello blue french fries Mrs. Moe!”. Fair warning, you may start hearing some giggles during this round as some of the names will sound silly!

You can continue this with different favorite things, or even describing words. Some ideas that you can use for extra rounds are:

• favorite animal
• favorite leisure activity
• adjective that starts with the first letter of their name

Hickety Picket Bumblebee

For early elementary students, you can do a name game with a song like “Hickety Pickety Bumblebee”.

The song goes like this:

“Hickety, Pickety, Bumblebee
Won’t you say your name for me? (Designated child says their first name.)

(Everyone else repeats the child’s first name).”

While this version is best for younger students, there are many variations of this song. You can even include some learning (yes, right at the start of the school year!) by including these verses, too:
“Let’s all whisper it. (Everyone else whispers it.)
Let’s all stomp it. (Everyone else stomps it.)
Let’s all clap it. (Everyone else claps the syllables.)
Let’s all shout it! (Everyone shouts it.)”

These fun icebreakers are a great way to help you learn the name of each of your students during the very first class! At the end of the game, you can even challenge yourself to go around the circle and recite everyone’s name!

#2: Classroom Scavenger Hunt

You may have heard of utilizing scavenger hunts for learning – they’re fun and can be used as a team-building activity by splitting your students up into small groups!

With the common goal of finding everything on the list, each team member will be excited to finish the scavenger hunt. You can make it a competition and add a time limit to see how fast the groups can get to the finish line!

You can include certain areas of your classroom, before even explaining them, which can help add to the excitement of the new school year! This could include where they turn in work, find games, go for group time, find the classroom jobs, and so much more!

Not only does this team-building game help with social skills, it helps each student to explore where they will be learning for the following weeks of school. Win-win-win!

#3: Back to School Boom Cards

These Boom Cards are a great resource for you to use at the start of the year, or even throughout the year when you want to get to know your students a little bit better! 

The icebreaker questions on these cards will help your students see that everyone thinks in different ways and have different interests!

There are three different categories:

• yes/ no questions
• would you rather
• open ended questions

“Would you rather take a bath in ice or jelly?”, “if you could be an animal, what would you be?” and “do you like lemonade?” are just a few examples of the questions you will find in this resource. With 30 questions total, 10 in each question category, you’ll be able to get to know your little learners even further! 

Grab yours so that you have them ready to use at any moment of the school year!

#4: Get to Know Me Puzzle Pieces

While this is more of an individual activity, it is still a great way for the class to get to know each other and to build a sense of community. It’s also a great way to save time on a bulletin board display, because your students will help you with it! 

Each student will need a piece of paper with a puzzle piece printed on it which you will have them cut out so that you can connect them on the bulletin board. Or buy them off of amazon here.

Students get to design a puzzle piece that represents who they are. You can even have some “requirements” for what each student should include when they decorate their puzzle piece. For example, you can make sure each student includes their name, favorite color, favorite food, favorite activity, favorite animal, and even favorite number.

With this being more of a calming activity, allowing students to be creative, it is perfect to have students start with during class. You can easily just have the puzzle piece waiting for them at their seats for when they come in at the start of class!

After your students have completed their puzzle piece, ask for volunteers who would like to share their creations in front of the class. This activity can help make sure students know they are all unique and are an important part of your classroom community!

#5: Human Bingo

Okay, who doesn’t love a good game of bingo?? Add in learning more about each person in your class and it’s a PERFECT way to start the year!

For this activity, you will just need a bingo board for each student. Each square on the board should include an interesting fact that a student in your class may relate to! You can easily make a bingo board that is grade level appropriate.

For early elementary, keep it simple with “I Statements” and make sure that you include pictures with each item on the bingo board! Here are some examples of interesting facts:

• I’ve lost a tooth
• I have a pet
• I love art 
• I like to sing/dance
• I have a sibling
• I love water
• I have brown hair

For older students, you can put “find someone who” at the top of the BINGO board and then include the following statements:

• plays an instrument
• went out of state on vacation this summer
• plays on a sports team
• has a birthday in the same month of the year as you
• is the oldest (youngest, middle, etc.) sibling
• has the same favorite color as you

Allow your students to go around the room and ask their classmates questions that will help them not only get to know each other, but complete their bingo card! Don’t forget to have those pieces of candy ready to give the winner(s)!

Here is a bingo like game that you can snag for free!

#6: Tallest Tower

Team building games are a great way to help students get to know each other even better, it also helps you to see how your students work right off the bat! Tallest tower is a team-building game (literally) that not only helps with critical thinking, but is also a great STEM challenge!

For this team-building game, students will be put into teams. Team size depends on the number of students in your class, but 3-4 students per team is ideal! You can choose what objects you’d like your students to use, making sure to provide only 2 types of materials, but newspaper and tape is a great option!

How to get started:

Explain to the students that they will be working in groups to create a tower and that their goal is to work with their team members to create the tallest tower out of all the groups! You can use any items you want for this from random paper products like tubes and newspapers to legos- whatever you have available!

Next, make sure each group has their supplies! The best way to get the students their supplies is by having one group member grab the materials and bring them back to the rest of the group. 

Tell students that they can only use the materials that were provided and that their objective is to make the tallest tower as a team! For younger students, it may be best to give examples of how they can manipulate the materials to make it easier to create a tower with them. For example, if using (news)paper you can demonstrate crumpling it into a ball or rolling it into a thin tube.

Give the teams 5-10 minutes to work together to create the tallest tower they can in that amount of time. Once time is up, go around with a measuring tape and write the height on a post-it note for only that team to see (this makes it a little more fun and suspenseful). Once you have measured each tower, declare the winner! 

Just wait until you see how well your students will work together to get the job done!

#7: Beach Ball Toss

This is a simple game to play at the end of the day, or even as a brain break! All you need is a beach ball and a permanent marker!

All over the beach ball, write some grade level appropriate get-to-know you questions. Some example questions:

• What’s your favorite sport to play?
• What’s your favorite ice cream flavor?
• If you had to create a nickname for yourself, what would it be?

Have your students stand in a circle and then choose a student to start with the ball. Have them toss it to someone else in the circle. The student should answer the question that their right thumb is on (if they feel comfortable doing so). Continue tossing the ball around the circle until everyone has had a chance to answer a question.

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#8: Speed Dating

This is a great activity for students to learn more about their peers by talking to them one-on-one! Students will be answering different questions that you present them and sharing their answers with the person they are paired up with. 

There can be as many rounds of this as you would like. You can adjust questions based off of the grade level you are teaching. Because this ice breaker game is so versatile, you can use this with even high school or middle school students!

How to get started:

Split students into two groups (there is no particular order for this). You can have students stand or sit in chairs for this activity. 

Have one group form a circle with everyone facing outwards, so their backs are to each other – this is the inner circle! Then, have the other group stand or sit outside of the circle so that they are facing someone from the original circle.

Once it is set up, explain to students that you will be playing music and when it starts that they should walk around in a circle. You can have one circle move and the other stay put, or you can have both move in opposite directions.

It may be easier to explain this to students like musical chairs – when the music starts, they start rotating around the circle and when it stops, they stop and face the person that is across from them in the circle! 

Once they have their new partner, they should take turns answering the question that you present to them. Make sure that you display the question on the board so that the students can re-read it as needed. 

Give students a time limit for answering the question, like 30-60 seconds, and then remind them to switch and have the other person in the partner pair answer the question.

Here are some questions you can have students answer:

• What are you the most excited about for this school year?
• If you could spend the entire day with anyone, who would it be and why?
• What do you want to learn more about this year?
• What’s your favorite activity to do outside of class?
• What three words best describe you?

The conversations that students have will be meaningful and impactful as they are talking one-on-one! Make sure that you pause yourself and take in the great conversations you will be witnessing!

Remember, getting to know your students should be at the top of your priorities at the beginning of the school year!

Having your class partake in any of these ice breakers is a great way to do just that! And, as a bonus, not as many lesson plans will be needed during the first week of school now that you have this list of simple icebreakers to utilize! Learn more about each member of your classroom community, and have fun doing it!

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