Well you could go out and buy Derren Brown’s book in order to learn a few memory techniques or you could do it by playing these fun name games with your group. So what’s it going to be? Oh, well in that case I’ll give you a minute while you order the Derren Brown book on Amazon and wait (pause) ten working days! While you wait, you might as well give these a go anyway…
Action name game
Where: indoors
Space needed: enough to sit in a circle
Number of children: 4-10
Equipment: None!
Have everyone sit in a circle; it’s usually best to arrange it so younger ones go first and older ones go last as they’ll have more to remember. Go round each person in turn and have them introduce themselves by saying their name and then doing an action to go with their name. The action could be something they like (dancing or playing football) or just a random action they want to do (star-jump or twirl). The person next to them has to say the first name and do the action, then add their own name and action The third person has to do the names and actions for the first two people, then add their own, and so on. This usually works better in small groups as it can get quite one-size-fits-all when the circle gets bigger than about eight people.
Name, name, goose
Where: indoors
Space needed: enough to sit in a circle and run around the outside
Number of children: 6+
Equipment: None!
Why make up a new game when you can just adapt an old classic! Get the children to sit in a circle and ask one person to be ‘it’. ‘It’ goes around the outside of the circle touching each seated person on their head in turn while saying their name. However, at any point ‘it’ can say ‘goose’ instead of a person’s name and the ‘goose’ then has to chase ‘it’ around the outside of the circle. If ‘it’ makes it safely round the circle and into the ‘goose’ space without being caught, the ‘goose’ becomes ‘it’. However, if the ‘goose’ catches ‘it’, he or she will stay as ‘it’.
Umm… Bop!
Where: indoors
Space needed: enough to sit in a wide circle
Number of children: 5+
Equipment: a long balloon
By now you should know each other’s names fairly well, so it’s time to up the jeopardy. If you can’t remember a person’s name in this game you’re going to get whacked… with a balloon.
Get everyone to sit in a large circle and have one person stand in the middle with a long balloon. A leader will start the game by calling out the name of someone in the circle. The person in the middle begins walking towards that person to bop them on the head with the balloon. The person whose name was called needs to shout out the name of someone else in the circle before they get bopped. If they do, the person with the balloon has to try and bop that person before they can shout out a third person’s name.
Keep playing until the person with the balloon manages to bop someone before they can shout out a name. If they do, the bopped person becomes the person in the middle with the balloon and a leader starts the next round by calling out another name. At the start, encourage the person with the balloon to walk around, and make the circle large enough to give everyone a chance to call out a name before being bopped. As they get better at the game, the person with the balloon may need to run just to stand any chance of keeping up!
Uncompetitive Islands
Where: indoors
Space needed: enough to run around
Number of children: 6+
Equipment: several islands about a halfmetre square or bigger and music
This is a version of musical chairs, but instead of chairs it’s played with islands: large pieces of cardboard placed around the room. Spread the islands around the room and tell the kids to run, dance or strut around the hall. When the music stops they have to try and leap onto a cardboard island and make sure they’re not touching the ‘sea’ (the floor). More than one child can share a piece of cardboard, so cut your cardboard according to the size of your group! Want one more game? The game ‘Who’s under the blanket?’ is another good way of reinforcing people’s names and can be found on our website in the FREE resources section. For that game you’ll need to know everyone’s names first so perhaps play it with one of the games above.
Steve Mawhinney is the children’s worker for Barnsbury Parish, Islington
