Ok so yesterday we started the class by learning a really fantastic warm up game. I play a game similar to this with students in and out of drama but i think this one was much better. I think there were around about 8 or 9 layers to it. The game started with passing a current around a circle using a gesture, voice and eye contact. The gesture was like a clap pointing in the direction the energy was being passed with a ‘zip’ and making sure eye contact was made with the person that was receiving the energy (this is the case for all layers; eye contact with the person receiving the energy).
The second layer was to add a ‘boing’, throwing hands up in the air; this reversed the direction of the energy.
The third layer was to add a ‘bang’ (I think) making a hand gun thing with your hands and passing the energy to anyone in the circle.
The fourth layer was a ‘freak out’ in which everyone would throw their arms in the air run around a bit freaking out and then find a new place in the circle. The person who called the ‘freak out’ started energy back up again.
The fifth layer involved holding your arms out in an arc and saying ‘ooohhh’ and bringing both the volume and size of angle down. This is everyone so they are shoulder to shoulder in a small circle. The person who initiated starts the energy off again but everything is small.

The sixth layer is the inverse of the previous layer used to bring the circle from small back out to its normal size.
The seventh layer is clapping at someone and asking them a question, they don’t have to answer truthfully so what ever comes to mind.
The eighth layer was adding an emotion to the game so everyone had to play and act as if affected by this emotion.
That is the game as we played it but as many layers as possible could be added, one a lesson for however long you could add them or get students to think of ones and add that as well. The game was good because it certainly got me warmed up both physically and vocally and had me concentrating so I wasn’t to mess up the flow and keeps it going at a certain speed.