Whether you are standing in line at the bank or standing in line to ride Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland, waiting can be a trying time for kids. Here are three verbal games to make things more fun. These are aimed at older children. If you have little kids, take a peek at 3 Ways to Entertain Small Children While Waiting.
Alphabetically Speaking
Choose a random letter of the alphabet. Take turns having each person say a sentence as part of a conversation you are all having. The tricky part is that each person must begin his or her sentence with whichever letter is next in the alphabet, and he or she can’t take too long to think about it. When you get to Z, continue with A until you get to the letter you started with. So a conversation might start like this:
Have you seen Avatar yet?
I have; it was great!
Jake was my favorite character.
Kate was mine.
Let’s go see it again next week.
Maybe on Friday?
No, I have guitar lessons that day.
Oh, how about Saturday?
Perhaps; I’ll have to check my calendar.
Quite a busy life you have!
Really, you think so?
Seems like you are always busy doing something.
Speak as One
In this game you form sentences by each person saying every other word. If there are two or three people, it works well to tell a story. If there are four people, pair them off. Each pair acts as one person, saying every other word. It can be really fun to have the two pairs have a conversation.
Verbal Tennis
This is a challenging game for sure. In this game, you take turns adding a sentence to the conversation. The trick is that you may only ask questions, no statements allowed. Also, you may not start your questions with, “Don’t you think that…” or some other similar phrase that is just a statement disguised as a question. So a conversation might start like this:
Where did you get that shirt?
Why? Do you like it?
How could I not?
What do you think of the color?
Do you think it is more of a red or an orange?
Can you stand in the light so I can see?
I spend a lot of time with an improv comedy group, and I was surprised to find that every one of these is the same as an improv game. They play "60-second Alphabet," "Two- Person Story," and "Questions Only." Of course, they're trying for comedy, but now I'm looking at some of their other games and thinking of how I could use them with kid!
Well, as it happens, I'm taking an improv class, and yes, these ideas came from there. I should have noted that. I have mentioned the improv connection on some other posts (I wrote one about not saying no) but I forgot to on this one. Kids love improv games!