All-Star Team Bonding Favorites

[cheerforeverever]

are there any team bonding games that could be played at practice?

There are loads! Here's some, including the machine game that people have been mentioning:

Machine builder game: divide the group into teams (3 or more teams). Assign each group to build a certain machine with their own bodies such as a toaster, washing machine, vacuum cleaner, lawn mower, television, etc. Give them time to work it out. Then they build the machine and the other teams guess what it is.

Join the circle game- have one person start and list off things about themselves. When another person hears something that they have in common with that person, they get up and join hands. The new person lists things about themselves now until another person gets up to join hands. The game keeps going until everyone has linked hands, making a circle.

A round of applause- Take one volunteer from the team out of the room, but don't tell them what they volunteered for and make sure they can't hear outside. Spread out a bunch of various objects around the room and explain to the rest of the team the game rules : The object of the game is for the team to lead the teammate to do a specified task by only applauding. The volunteer can talk but no one can answer them or respond besides clapping. Examples of tasks are things such as sitting in a certain chair, touching a door knob, picking up a red colored ball( which gets really fun if there are several colored balls around), and things more difficult such as making a snow angel or doing a series of events.

Animal sounds grouping challenge – assign each person an animal secretly and say that people can only find each other by the sound their animal makes. Everyone must close their eyes( no peeking!) and just listen. It gets really fun if you put things such as "giraffe" or "squirrel"......you'd be surprised at the sounds they make according to the team hahaha

Log tag: everyone lays down on their stomach (ideally in groups of 3 but you can do extras in groups of 2), with one person being "it" and one person being an extra. The extra gets chased by the "it" person until they lay down on one side of a log group. The person on the other end of the log group then gets "pushed off" and is the extra that gets chased, until they find a log group. The game goes on until everyone gets tired lol......great for getting some energy out

Back telephone: just like a game of telephone except everyone sits in a row (like they were in a massage train) and the first person draws something on the next person's back. It goes down the line, with the last person having to say what they thought was drawn on their back.

Those are just a few of the many I've done with different teams over the years : )

 

[canttouchthis]

I was team mom last year and I wracked my brain for things I could do to help the team bond from my side of things.
Our goal was to win Cheersport Nationals. I knew the kids had the talent and the bond, they just needed to believe in themselves. I bought a piece of pink glitter cardstock and cut out a big heart. I wrote BELIEVE in the middle and wrote all the kids and coaches names on the heart. I then cut the heart into 39 pieces (36 girls 3 coaches) and randomly handed the pieces out to each of the 39 people to wear in their cheer shoes. I told them they were 1 heart with 39 pieces. They won Cheersport and got the highest level 3 score! Some of the girls told me that the heart was their favorite thing and that they will always keep their piece.

what cheer gym was this?

 

[cheermeup]

what cheer gym was this?

Midwest Cheer Elite West Chester.

 

[cheerforeverever]

Animal sounds grouping challenge – assign each person an animal secretly and say that people can only find each other by the sound their animal makes. Everyone must close their eyes( no peeking!) and just listen. It gets really fun if you put things such as "giraffe" or "squirrel"......you'd be surprised at the sounds they make according to the team hahaha

I forgot to put that there are multiples of each animal, and they are trying to find each other ( so all of the "cats" would essentially meow to find each other and make a group ).

 

[PeaceLoveCEA]

We play "the knot." We all stand in a circle and grab hands with a different person for each hand. Then you have to untangle the knot until it is one circle. It is team building because we have to work together or else the game doesn't work.
I also LOVE lock-ins because you really get to know one another.

 

[Alliecatzy]

The funnest and most effective team bonding activity ive ever done was when it was the beginning of the cheer season last year and all of the returners kidnapped (dressed in black, blind folded the people and threw them in our cars) the new people who just made the team and had a sleepover

 

[Num1Stunta]

My coach in college did a great one when we went to NCA camp. It was called "the fruit basket"... the concept is basically that, anytime you are with a group of people somewhere in life- work, school, team, etc- there are certain personality types that stick out. I can only remember a few examples, but there were about 20 or 30 of them, and I know I have the paper filed away somewhere:

The Cherry- the mom of the group who always takes care of everyone
The Pineapple- the crazy one, loud and funny (me lol)
The Grapes- always stick together with the other grapes in a bunch
The Melon- plain and quiet, just goes along with whatever
The Lemon- bitter and harsh, says mean things sometimes

Anyway, we each had to read the list and decide which one we THOUGHT we were. Then, we went around in a circle and everyone had to guess which one we were. It was funny if someone picked something like "cherry" for themselves, which was nice and sweet, and then everyone was like "no, b***h, you're the lemon" lol

So, our coach had this heart-shaped box, which we each put a sticker on that represented our fruit. We were supposed to bring a rock with our name written on it and put it in the box. Half our team forgot the rock though lol

I've always wanted to do something like this, except on a poster at the gym. Like, put a fruit basket in the middle and have them draw and cut out their fruits with their name on them. It would say "Senior 3- A bunch of fruits, but they all go together in the same basket" Or something cheesy like that lol

 

[CoachPam]

Myself and another coach created a game for the younger ones to play...a cheer version of Ships and Sailors. You have practice on one side and competition on the other. There's scrub the mat, two people stretching, three people doing motions, two people stunting, people falling out of a stunt (looks like cockroach), and coach is coming (you have to stand clean) and until I say waterbreak you may not move.

The younger kids absolutely love this and I constantly have them running back and forth across the mat for practice and competition. They don't realize it's conditioning, because they're having so much fun!

 

[Hi-Phlyer21]

What's whirlyball?!

it's at this place and they have a bunch of room set up with like bumper cars and you have those little scooper things where it's like a i can't really describe it but it's so the ball can go in and like swoosh it out or maybe it's hocky stixk... its the point is you get something with which to maneuver the ball... lol. and uhm there's goals on each side and each team drives their bumper cars around and tries to get the ball into the other teams goal. it's so much fun.. and they have like other games there too like pool and some arcade type things but yeah

 

[stuntjumptumble]

We were put into small groups and had to make up a routine (with jumps, stunts, and tumbling) in 15 mintues! And the groups were really hard, like it was all bases, all flyers, etc. It turned out hilarious!

 

[Hi-Phlyer21]

OOOOOOOHH also team machine s a fun game. we play that alot over the summer and, like, uhm idk what it's called but you lay a tarp or something on the floor and make the whole team stand on it. or like half the team and then there's certain people who are not allowed to talk (typically people with the leader a-type personailty, you know the one everyone always listens to or will listen to if they say something) and with out anyone stepping off the tarp onto the floor...they havto get it completely turned over to the other side.

 

[The_cheer_obsessed]

Having BBQ's, sleepovers, holiday parties, pool parties

 

[txcheergirl11]

At texas, the level 5 iniation always bonds all of the level 5 athletes

 

[Deleted member 8658]

ohh scavanger hunts too

yep they are so much fun there is always a bunch of cheerleaders running around the mall taking pictures of things on the scavanger hunt such as people wearing team colors and random things like that

 

[kcpack22]

are there any team bonding games that could be played at practice?

What my team does sometimes is blind routines where we take a stunt group on the mat at a time (so it's not dangerous) and mark out the routine with your eyes shut the entire time!! It's really funny to see how well people know their spots and can literally, "do it with their eyes closed." In one of our "blind routines" i ended up in the back corner of the mat facing backward toward the wall working the dance like there's no tomorrow. hahaha.