Ice Breaker, "Mingle, Mingle, Mingle!" Carol Jackson; English Teacher, Dutch Fork High School

"This is a great icebreaker for a class to get to know each other better, and it also gives students a chance to get up and move around! Give students an index card, and on that card, have them write a question they would like to ask other students (like "what is your favorite song", "do you have any siblings" etc). Have students move around room singing "Mingle mingle mingle!" (like the cha-cha) and when the teacher says stop, students should grab the person closest to them to exchange answers to both of their questions. After they have talked for about 30 seconds about their answers, students exchange cards so they have a different question to ask, and "mingle" again!"

"The Toilet Paper Game" Christine Murciar: Davenport Central High School

"For an icebreaker to be used with any grade. Throw out a role of toilet paper and tell the students to take as much as they need. (Don't tell them what it's for). After everyone has taken some, have them tear the toilet paper at the perforations. For each square of paper in their possession, they have to share one fact about themselves."

Networking Donna, High School Teacher: Spokane, WA

"Get your students use to collecting information about each other early on in the school year. Place students in groups and encourage them to exchange phone numbers, email addresses or any information that is useful to get in touch with each other. During this time, ask students to share with each other some of the classes they have taken and hints on how they have studied in the past to get good grades. During this time, you can also encourage them to form study groups and meet after class time or show them how to set up a chat room discussion that enables them to meet online. This is also a great way to get students to communicate with each other outside of class."

Fantasy Island Ann, Guidance Counselor: Northport, NY

"To help students get in touch with what's important to them and to introduce themselves to others in the class. Students will need construction paper and markers or crayons. Students are told to imagine that the piece of paper in an island. The island is theirs and they can have anything on the island that they want. Encourage the students to draw images of anything that they'd like to have on their "Fantasy Island"... After drawings are finished, students are paired off with a buddy. They share with each other about their island. After 5-10 minutes, the pairs are invited to share with the class what they've discovered about their buddies' similarities and differences."

"What Am I?" Jessie, Staff Coordinator: Temple, OR

"Years ago before I got into administration, I would start every year off with this game. I would take out about 100 post-it notes and then give one to each student. Students would get in circle. Each student writes a noun (person, place, or thing) on the card. Then they stick the post-it on the forehead of the person to their right, noun showing. Each person then gets a turn to ask the group a "yes/no" that will help them guess what it is. If they don't get it right, we move on to the next person in the circle clockwise. I usually give some sort of prize to the three people that took the least number of guesses to get it right."