7 Cool Post-it Note Icebreaker Activities

How to start your very first lesson or transition to study after a long summer vacation? The following activities help you easily break the ice with your English students. Students of all ages love interesting games that encourage interaction. Try one of them as a starter or as an icebreaker!

1. All-Star Class

Ask students to draw an self portrait and display them on a bulletin board in class. Each person writes a positive adjective describing each of their classmates on a sticky note and sticks it to the portrait. Do this activity in 1 day or over a period of time, let students take their portraits home.

It’s a fun and engaging activity for the first day of school. You can also adopt it to the online activity by using Google Presentations or similar tools.

Also Read: 11 Steps to Teaching Confidence in the ESL Classroom

2. Where Are You From?

This game works well for a class of international students. Give each person a post-it note flag to place on their home country on your classroom world map. After everyone has placed their map, the other students try to guess whose note is whose.

Try this game as a part of “World Tour/Nationalities” Topic. Encourage students to share their stories to set up a friendly atmosphere.

3. Get to Know

For this activity, ask students to write 5 facts about themselves on a post-it note, then put the notes on the board. Choose one and read it aloud. Try to guess who wrote it. When you get the right student, that person takes a turn with the remaining notes. Continue until all the notes are gone.

You can also adjust this game to a more specific topic like character traits, physical features or interests.

Also Read: Differences Between Two Learning Modes: Young Students vs. Adults

4. A Matched Set

Students write 5 fun facts about themselves and turn the paper in to the the teacher. Write each fact on a post-it note along with a matching one with that student's name. When students are not in the room, put the post-its all around the room. Students race to match the names with the correct facts (they can’t match their own name).

5. Question Mixer

Write the name of a well-known person on a sticky note (write enough so everyone in class has one). Stick a note to each student’s back. Students ask classmates 1 yes/no question at a time until they have figured out who is on their back.

6. Two Truths and a Lie

Give each student 3 post-it notes. On 2 notes, they write something true about themselves; on the third - something false. Students share in groups of 4-5 and try to guess which statement is a lie.

For online classes, you can use a shared Google Document to write statements.

Also Read: 3 Reasons Why Students Get Motivated to Learn a Foreign Language

7. Hidden Treasure

Write several icebreaker questions on the sticky side of post-it notes and stick them to the board. Each student takes turns choosing 1 sticky note and answering the question on the back. They then choose another student to answer the same question.

This activity can be easily carried out online. Create this game using the WordWall website.

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