Age: 7 to adult
Players: Individuals/whole class
Time: 10 minutes
Skills: Ice-breaker, mime and movement, warm up
A fun and effective physical warm-up that involves juggling imaginary plates like a waiter
Everybody stands in a circle. Discuss how waiters need to be super-skilled to carry dishes across a restaurant. In this game, everyone is a waiter. Now show them the special Waiter Plate sequence: Hold an imaginary plate out to your side, turn it in towards your body, keep it turning in the same direction until your hand rises above you, still with the palm towards the ceiling. You will need to bend your body to allow this. Continue turning the ‘plate’ round – keeping it flat – and bring it back to the starting position. (For a short video demonstrating this, go to https://geni.us/waiter-plate.)
Ask them to imagine what food is on their plate, for example, spaghetti, soup or a fried breakfast. Now, they must move their plates without spilling anything. Once they have tried it a few times, they can experiment with the other hand (and a different dish from the menu). Next, as in the video, they should try both hands at once!
Finally, ask them to imagine that the space inside the circle is a restaurant. They are all going to make a winding journey across the circle to a new place on the opposite side. People should pass close to each other, keeping their plates moving.
Director's Tips
- The centre of the circle should resemble a busy restaurant.
- When everybody has arrived in a new place you can go round and ask people what they had on their plates.
- You could also try this with paper plates.