Age: 6 to adult
Players: Whole Group
Time: 10 minutes
Skills: Language, mime and movement, creativity
Everyone walks around in the space. Instruct the players that they must move around buzzing and flapping their wings like a bee. The teacher calls out a random letter of the alphabet and everyone has five seconds to make the shape of an object with their body which begins with that letter. After five seconds they should freeze. It doesn't matter how correct the shape is. To make it easier you can also allow them to use verbs and adjectives as well as nouns. So for example if you say the letter ‘T‘ they could choose turtle, tea bag, terrified or tiptoeing.
Next the teacher asks each player to name their object one by one. If two or more people have made the same object, then those players sit out. The remaining students walk around the space and the teacher calls out a new letter. Keep playing until there are only one or two people left. The game encourages players to be creative and not always choose the most obvious object.
Director's tip
A fun variation is to choose a different animal each time, so they could cluck like a hen, squeak like a pig or baa like a lamb.
Watch out for players who subtly change their choice when they hear someone else say the same thing!
David Farmer runs the website www.dramaresource.com – a site that offers a wide range of ideas, games and courses for drama practitioners. He is the author of several books including 101 More Drama Games and Activities, from which this game is taken.