Icebreakers, energizers games in presentation skills

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15 May 2020
Professor Moinuddin Chowdhury
Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP)
Faculty of Business Studies
Mirpur Cantonment
Dhaka-1216
Subject: Submission of term paper on “Icebreakers, Energizers Games in Presentation Skills”
Mr. Chowdhury,
It is our pleasure to present the term paper on ‘Ice breaker and energizer in Presentation’ as a
requirement of Presentation skill development course in Bangladesh University of professionals
(BUP). We enjoyed preparing this term paper though challenging to finish within the given time.
We have tried our best level to include all relevant information related to Ice breaking and
energizing in presentation. We have strongly belief that the report will fulfill your expectation and
tried to give our best effort so that we can prepare solid term paper according to your instruction.
We would be grateful if you accept our team report. All our efforts will be successful if the term
paper can server its purpose.
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of Team 1
Md. Jahirul Islam Bhuiyan
ID: 2023031077
MBA professionals, BUP
Batch: 23 Section: A
Name Roll
Md. Khaled Hossain 2023031075
Afsana Ahmed Ina 2023031061
Yeasira Afrin 2023031073
Kazi Fahim Hasan 19022071
Mohammad Mydul Islam 2023031053
Md Baha Uddin 2023031051
Masuma Yesmin 2023031055

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Abstract
Ice breaking is the first and foremost part of any kind of presentation which creates the
environment very friendly and make more flexible to speakers. Getting to know each other, getting
people to think about a specific topic, or simply just to wake up a sleepy and tired group Ice-
breakers and energizers are used. Ice-breaking activities and energizers are great for team building.
Icebreakers are always thought of as the way to get audience comfortable and familiar with the
speaker. Each of the audience comes to the presentation in a completely different mood. A simple
ice-breaker can put everyone on the same level and energize them for presentation. Get your
audience to do a simple exercise to reset their minds and refocus on your talk. By starting with an
ice-breaker Ice-breakers create comfort among people who cannot communicate easily. So it acts
as a bridge between presenter and all audience weather they are introvert or extrovert. The
Energizer is an activity that can be run to warm up the audience. It is a good meeting starter for
any presentation. Many people think of ice breaker and energizers as an optional activity to be
done if there is time. People should consider it as an integral part because it’s an effective
communication tool. The ice-breaker you show your audience that your talk will be interactive and
require their participation. Ice-breaker is something that will set the stage for the presentation. This
term paper tells everything what speaker need to know about using ice breaker and energizer for
effective presentation.
Keywords:
Icebreaking, Energizers, Friendly, Effective, Memorable, Enjoyable, Activity, team
building, Understanding, interaction, Breaker Strategy, collaboration, exercise intended,
learning environment, communicating, conversation, participation, capability-to-speak,
quick-assessment, understanding, comfortable etc.

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Table of Contents
S. l Topic Page
I Introduction 5
II Icebreaker 6
III Why we use icebreaking 7
IV To break the awkwardness or silence 7
V Get the blood flowing 7
VI How to use icebreaker 8
VII Icebreaking steps 9-10
VIII Sample of icebreaker 11
IX Introductory Icebreaker 11
X Team- building icebreaker 11
XI Topic exploration icebreaker 12-13
XII Energizer 14
XIII How to use Energizer 14
XIV Sample of Energizer 15
XV Read out load 15
XVI Breathing exercise 15
XVII Boring presentation vs. Energized presentation 16-17
XVIII Conclusion 18
XIX References 19

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Introduction
Ice breaker games are an effective way of starting a training session or team building activities
where people do not know each other. But they can also be used if a group of people know each
other well feel but feel embarrassed because they have to tackle a difficult or new subject together.
The facilitator can use ice breaker games as a quick assessment of the group to gauge how much
they know about the topic, how comfortable they are in groups, what is their background, expertise
and so on.
The key to a successful ice breaker is to make sure it is focused on meeting your objectives and
appropriate to the group of people involved. Ice breaker is the most important aspect in human
interaction. People communication and interact with others by using it. In a wide community,
speaking is the productive skill. When we speak we produce the text and it should be meaningful.
In the nature of communication, we can find the speaker, the listener, the message and the
feedback. It means that speaking is an activity to express feeling and idea orally, there are some
examples of speaking activities, they are dialogue, interview, speech act and etc. In teaching and
learning process commonly the speaker have problem from themselves because of making
mistakes to express their idea in some sentences. (Nuraeni, 2018)
Actually in communicating, every speaker must speak up. It’s started from trying it the practice
continuously without feeling afraid. Every mistake can be corrected and the speaker can learn from
those mistakes to develop their speaking ability, because the purpose of learning to speak or
communicate. Verbal or non-verbal communication is the way to express idea, to practice
dialogue, to tell the story, and especially to communicate with their audience or in their daily
conversation. But in fact, most of the speakers do not have that capability to speak in front of
audience as well. Most of the speakers at the public place do not know how to speak even though
in a simple conversation with their audience. In fact, they have learnt many things in but they are
not able to use in spoken language. The speakers sometimes face many problems in learning
speaking because many factors such as they are shy of speaking in the class.
Therefore, it is important to stimulate the speaker to speak in the stage. Based on the statement,
the researcher chooses Ice Breaker strategy to make the speaker become active to improve their
speaking ability. This study reveals about the efforts to improve the speakers learning outcomes.
This strategy will train the speaker to be able to speak. Ice Breaker can be useful way to start a
presentation or training session.
It can be a game or activity that is used to introduce people to each other so that they feel more
relaxed together. It is one kinds of providing instruction with active learning Strategy, because this
strategy more emphasize on the activeness in learning process. The researcher thinks that Ice
Breaker Strategy can help to develop speaking ability, because it gives a chance to learn and also
to play with. (Huyen, 2003).

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Icebreaker
We always think that only presenters are tensed and anxious but the audiences are also excited.
This excitement creates anxiety. Tensions from both sides create a distance of understandingwith
ice in atmosphere. Only a successful and effective presenter can redefine this situation and break
this ice. An icebreaker literally breaks the ‘ice’ between Presenter and Audience.
An icebreaker is a facilitation exercise intended to help a group to begin the process of forming
themselves into a team. Icebreakers are commonly presented as a game to "warm up" the group
by helping the members to get to know each other. They often focus on sharing personal
information such as names, hobbies, etc. An icebreaker supposed to be related to the subject or the
purpose of the meeting. For a collaborative learning environment is needed for a training project,
then an icebreaker exercise that promotes collaboration could be chosen. If the subject of the
meeting is reading books, then the subject of the meeting could be introduced through anexercise
that revolves around participant's favorite books. (Psychology Wiki, 2010)
Icebreakers are also relaxing and non-threatening, should not embarrass the participants or make
them feel compelled to participate. They should also not show disrespect for any social and
professional hierarchies in the group, as this can be uncomfortable for participants. At the end of a
well-chosen icebreaker exercise, the facilitator often summarizes for the group what was learned
during the exercise.

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Why we use icebreaking
To Break the Awkwardness or Silence
It’s never fun to sit in a room full of people you may not know. Sometimes in these awkward
situations, we tend to stare at our phones, but do nothing. Other times we fidget uncomfortably
and look around until the presentation begins.
Get the Blood Flowing
Meetings are more effective when you are up and moving around before it starts. It is nice to get
the blood flowing and energy boosted before a meeting.
Get People to Know One Another
Who doesn’t like to network? Or even make new friends! When in an organization or at a
conference, icebreakers are helpful because you get to know others better. When doing
icebreakers, you may learn something important about a peer you may have not known of before.
Get People to Interact With the Group
When interacting with others and getting to know them on a more personal basis, it strengthens
the connection and meeting as a whole. An individual is more likely to talk to someone they know
or have something in common with then they would with a stranger.
To Have Fun!
They are just fun! For some people, icebreakers are the only thing they have to get to know others.
Not everyone is good at making conversation on their own. They need a little pick-me-up game or
event that is going to help them open up. (Cossar, 2014)

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How to use icebreaker
Conducting any relevant icebreaker depends on 5 major factors
1. Context:
It the context is formal, we have to go for a formal icebreaker. Or if the context is informal we
have to go for an informal icebreaker.
2. Time critical factor:
Ideally icebreakers should be 10% to 15% of the total time of the allocated time of the whole
presentation. Again it depends on the art of the presenter.
3. Background of the audience:
We should check the level of knowledge of participants, their age, and language proficiency and
socio- economic factors so that we can contribute to the successful implementation of the
icebreaker.
4. Safety:
We have to make sure that it minimizes physical and mental stress and pressure of the audience.
The main purpose of icebreakers is to get the audience involved and draw their attention but not to
put them in crisis or problems. They should have productive and enjoyable time from any
icebreaker.
5. Size of the audience:
As the group gets bigger time management changes and so does its operation and resources. From
different sizes of audiences there are different types of icebreakers. Therefore, we have to choose
‘icebreaker’ very wisely and in a very well-planned way. (Peterson, 2018)

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Icebreaker Steps
1. Divide the meeting participants into groups of four or five people by having them number off.
(You do this so that your participants get to know fellow attendees. People generally begin a
meeting by sitting with the people they already know best, when your goal is normally team
building across a group).
2. Tell the newly formed groups that their assignment is to think for a minute and then to share
with their group the one word that describes X. In the first venture with this icebreaker,
leading a session on organizational culture, the request from the group was that they think
about their current culture and come up with one word to describe it.
3. This icebreaker helps the group explore their thoughts on a common issue. This icebreaker is a
perfect segue into the topic of the meeting or training class. The group was fascinated by the
variety of the words chosen by the other participants to describe their culture. Consequently,
the icebreaker did provide a snapshot of the current thinking of the group about their culture.
(The group's one-word culture descriptions ranged broadly: funky, family, fun, bipolar,
fractured, cohesive, inspiring, and motivational are samples of their chosen words.
4. This icebreaker sparked spontaneous conversation in every group as the participants
questioned each other about the meaning of their one word. They asked for examples and
found that the combination of the participants' chosen words did describe their current
organizational culture.
5. Upon completion of the initial spontaneous discussion, ask the participants to share their one
word with the larger group. Ask for a volunteer to start and then, ask each participant to share
their one word that described their culture. (Even your most quiet members are comfortable
sharing their one word.
6. Next, after the participants have listened to the variety of words from the larger group, ask
them to explore several questions in their small group. In this instance, asking each participant
to select one word to describe their organizational culture, the participants were then asked
these follow-up questions.
 Is this culture consistent across
building department?
 Is this culture that you want to
have your organization?
 Does this culture support the
accomplishment of the
environment you desire for
employees and the achievement of
your company goals?
Your opportunity for follow up questions is endless. These debriefing questions can support the
content of your training class or meeting.

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7. Debrief the icebreaker by asking for a volunteer from each group to share a point or two that
highlighted their discussion. (You will find that many of the session attendees took notes.)
8. Because your participants are almost always your best source of laughter and fun in a
meeting or training session, each of these steps generated remarks, insights, ah-has, and
examples.
9. Upon completion, move into the rest of the material you have prepared for the session.
This one-word icebreaker takes 10–15 minutes with the initial enthusiastic, unstructured
discussion that the icebreaker generates. Total time will depend on the number of additional
questions that you ask the group to discuss as part of the brief of the one-word icebreaker. (Mind
Tools Corporate team, 2016)

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Sample of icebreaker
There are many types of ice breakers, each suited to different types of objectives. Here we look at
a few of the more popular type’s icebreaker and how it can be use in presentation.
Introductory Ice Breakers
These are used to introduce participants to each other and to facilitate conversation amongst them.
The Little Known Fact: ask participants to share their name, department or role in the
organization, length of service, and one little known fact about themselves.
This "little known fact" becomes a humanizing element that can help break down differences such
as grade/status in future interaction. (Mediavine, 2019)
True or false: ask your participants to introduce themselves and make three or four statements
about themselves, one of which is false. Now get the rest of the group to vote on which fact is
false.
As well as getting to know each other as individuals, this exercise helps to start interaction within
the group.
Interviews: ask participants to get into twos. Each person then interviews his or her partner for a
set time while paired up. When the group reconvenes, each person introduces their interviewee to
the rest of the group.
Problem Solvers: ask participants to work in small groups. Create a simple problem scenario for
them to work on in a short time. Once the group have analyzed the problem and prepared their
feedback, ask each group in turn to present their analysis and solutions to the wider group.
Team-Building Ice Breakers
These are used to bring together individuals who are in the early stages of team building. This can
help the people start working together more cohesively towards shared goals or plans.
The Human Web: this focuses on how people in the group inter-relate and depend on each other.
The facilitator begins with a ball of yarn. Keeping one end, pass the ball to one of the participants,
and the person to introduce him- or her-self and their role in the organization. Once this person has
made their introduction, ask him or her to pass the ball of yarn on to another person in the group.
The person handing over the ball must describe how he/she relates (or expects to relate) to the
other person. The process continues until everyone is introduced. (Brainstash, Inc, n.d.)
To emphasis the interdependencies amongst the team, the facilitator then pulls on the starting
thread and everyone's hand should move.

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Ball Challenge: this exercise creates a simple, timed challenge for the team to help focus on shared
goals, and also encourages people to include other people.
The facilitator arranges the group in a circle and asks each person to throw the ball across the
circle, first announcing his or her own name, and then announcing the name of the person to whom
they are throwing the ball. (The first few times, each person throws the ball to someone whose
name they already know.) When every person in the group has thrown the ball at least once, it's
time to set the challenge – to pass the ball around all group members as quickly as possible. Time
the process, then ask the group to beat that timing. As the challenge progresses, the team will
improve their process, for example by standing closer together. And so the group will learn to
work as a team.
Tell a photo story: Storytelling is critical to engaging our audience and helping them retain the
information we’re sharing. To practice developing narratives, find an interesting photo online and
record our self-presenting a story about it. Discuss what we think the back-story is who the people
are, their dreams, their motivations, and anything else that’ll tell a compelling story about them.
Hope, Fears and Expectations: best done when participants already have a good understanding
of their challenge as a team. Group people into twos or threes, and ask people to discuss their
expectations for the event or work ahead, including their fears and their hopes. Gather the group's
response by collating three to four hopes, fears and expectations from each pairing or threesome.
Topic Exploration Ice Breakers
These can be used to explore the topic at the outset, or perhaps to change pace and re-energize
people during the event.
Word association:
This helps people explore the breadth of the area under discussion. Generate a list of words related
to the topic of your event or training. For example, in a health and safety workshop, ask participants
what words or phrases come to mind relating to "hazardous materials." They might then suggest:
"danger," "corrosive," "flammable," "warning," "skull and crossbones," and so on. Write all
suggestions on the board, perhaps clustering by theme. You can use this opportunity to introduce
essential terms and discuss the scope (what's in and what's out) of your training or event. (Mind
Tools Corporate team, 2016)
Q & A with an expert:
We’ll need to find a friend for this one. Choose a topic or job that we don’t know much about. Ask
our friend to interview us about it and answer their questions as though we’re a well-informed
expert. This will help us with both our delivery and authority.

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Burning questions:
This gives each person the opportunity to ask key questions they hope to cover in the event or
training. Again you can use this opportunity to discuss key terminology and scope. Be sure to keep
the questions and refer back to them as the event progresses and concludes.
Brainstorm:
Brainstorming can be used to break the ice or as a re-energizer during an event. If people are
getting bogged down in the detail during problem solving, for example, you can change pace easily
by running a quick-fire brainstorming session. If you are looking for answers to customer service
problems, try brainstorming how to create problems rather than solve them. This can help people
think creatively again and gives the group a boost when energy levels are flagging.
Make up a Definition:
No matter what our presentation is about, we should always seem like we have authority over the
topic. For this exercise, choose a word we don’t know the definition of and record our self-saying,
with authority, what we think it means. Pay attention to how we can use our voice and intonations
to have more command and seem more authoritative.

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Energizer
Energizer is a short activity to bring
energy back to audience. We already
know irrespective of timing every
presentation has three stages to go
through. We start our opening with
big bang such as icebreaker,
greetings, PEG (Posture, Eye contact,
Gesture) formula, and excellent
question techniques and so on. In the
middle parts of our presentation the
level of energy of
our audience goes down gradually. Then we must consider some activities like energizer. The
energy level of audience comes back to the optimum level when they enjoy the energizers.
Energizers are especially useful after lunch or long periods of sitting, when the group energy is
frequently at its lowest and/or participants can seem to be the most disengaged. Energizers are also
useful when the group, trainer included, simply needs a fun break from training sessions.
(Reproline, 2018)
How to use Energizer
A tired audience is an impatient and distracted audience. To help ensure your presentation is
actually heard, it’s important to energize the audience.
There are 5 ways to energize the audience are given below:
1. Warm up the crowd by conducting a symphony. Conducting an audience symphony is
one of the easiest ways to get an audience engaged and energized at the beginning of a
presentation. To do so, have separate sections of the audience say different syllables that,
when combined, sound out the title of your presentation.
2. Have everyone stand-up and do the thumbs exercise. The thumbs exercise
(demonstrated in the video below) can be a great way to warm-up the audience. It’s something
unique that they have likely never done before and gets both the left and the right side of the
brain warmed-up.
3. Throw on some music and encourage dancing. Dancing can be a fun way to energize a
room and get people moving. At the start of the presentation, put on some music and just start
dancing. The courageous will join you, the others will at least be entertained by your mirthful
movements.
4. Get the audience to applaud 3 times. One of the things I learned from a few stand-up
veterans is the importance of the MC to bring the audience together, transforming them from
strangers ata comedy show to a collective audience, laughing together.

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One way to do that is to get the audience to applaud at least 3 times together. The act of doing it
all together helps them settle in as a group and get focused on what’s about to happen on stage.
This is way many comedians will start with statements like “You ready for a good show?”, “Give
it up for your headliner,” and “Applaud if you like breathing.”
5. Do the Wave. The simple act of standing up can wake the body up. Standing burns twice
as many calories as sitting and raises your heart rate. Doing it multiple times to create a wave
in the audience not only increases the energy of the room, but also gets the audience to do
something together.
Sample of energizers
Five Words: Challenge your class to list the five words in the English language that ends in
“CION” The five words is: Suspicion, coercion, epinicion, scion, and intersection.
Read Out Loud:
As a quick energizer, challenge participants to read the next two slides.
Show slide with “He said that that that that that woman said should have been which.” After
struggling for a while, someone is sure to deduce that the sentence is really:
“He said that that ‘that’ that that woman said should have been ‘which.’” After
discovering the pattern, the second one becomes easier.
Show slide with “It was and I said not but.”The punctuation that helps this reading is: “It was ‘and’
I said, not ‘but.’”
Breathing exercise:
It ramps up blood flow and increases oxygenation leading to more energy. On the calming side, it
stimulates your parasympathetic nervous system slowing your heart rate and controlling the release
of stress hormones. The next time you need to turn down or turn up your energy, try a breathing
exercise to help you out.

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Boring Presentation Vs Energized Presentation
Boring presentation, certainly do not have any clearly outline definition. But there are
characteristics to it.
Initiating with a preset dialogue, “I am here to talk about”, or something that does not capture
attention immediately. It is to be remembered that presentation is more impactful when it combine
saying with delivery. Debate goes on why it is inappropriate. But apparent conclusion does not
blame the thing, but the mode of delivery. As mentioned in the discussion.
Chances are a boring start may continue till the end. People without an attractive delivery may
continue the trend well into the presentation hours, providing enough time to sleep.
Presentation contents are often too heavy for audience to keep attention for long time, here is a
catch that a presentation is the tip of the iceberg. It should not be detailed al through, but detailed
to the specific. Heavy content presentation requires reading for a long time from the slide, difficult
for presenter to find an alternate, and boring for the audience to keep up for long. (Dill, 2014)
Many people are apparently scared of participation. Yet unless participated, they will lose contact
with the speaker. The fear comes from lack of early icebreaking in the presentation. So Speaker
will time to time have to engage people into this knowledge sharing process. The more words
come from the audience, the better.
“There can be no glamour, no romance, no truly great success, unless shared in by all.”
James E. Casey, Businessman
Audiences are fond of interactive presentation. Presentations that make feel time past too soon, As
per Kristi Hedges, a writer for Forbes, business people spend 37% time on presentation. They
would love to engage themselves in some of that. How do they see actually engaging in a
presentation?

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“PRESENTAR’s EVEN DON’T ASK”, idea given by Kristi that though it might sound too
obvious, a presenter may simply ask people to respond. There will always be enough people to
start responding, & number will keep growing. And responders do not find it as obvious as it may
seem to a presenter. People are seen more prone to interacting when they presentation starts with a
simple, yet too big a question. “Questions what we need answers for”, it starts storming in the
brain and an unfound answer will turn focus into presentation, and a found one will be longed to
share. Both making people listening.
“People interact when they get energized and the get energized when they trust you”
Olivia Mitchell
Then how to earn this trust. People are more inclined to value a presenter who delivers something
of value to them. Referring a presenters need for the ability make them laugh, smile, cry in a same
point.
People prefer answering questions. But question answers may lead to anywhere, they prefer the
presenter stays in the topic, if they cannot travel with him at the same pace. Any experience
otherwise would kill the presenter out of embarrassment, or an expense of a participant. None to
favoring to the audience.

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Conclusion
After perception, was discovered that the speakers talking expertise before the utilization Ice
Breaker system was low. It very well may be seen from the mean of understudies score and the
level of effective it is demonstrated that speaker talking expertise before the utilization of Ice
Breaker technique was low. The improvement of speakers score demonstrates that the speakersin
introduction talking expertise expanded fundamentally. In this manner, the specialist presumed
that Ice Breaker system can help understudies in talking ability.
Ice breakers can be an effective way of starting a training session or team-building event. As
interactive and often fun sessions run before the main proceedings, they help people get to know
each other and buy into the purpose of the event.
If such a session is well-designed and well-facilitated, it can really help get things off to a great
start. By getting to know each other, getting to know the facilitators, and learning about the
objectives of the event, people can become more engaged in the proceedings and so contribute
more effectively towards a successful outcome.

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References
Brainstash, Inc. (n.d.). Human Web Icebreaker. Retrieved from deepstash:
https://deepstash.com/idea/13751/the-human-web-ice-breaker
Cossar, S. (2014, 8 14). Language Learning. 5 Reasons to Use Ice-Breakers and Warm-Up
Exercises in Your ESL Classroom.
Dill, K. (2014). Never Give A Boring Presentation Again. The workforce, the workplace, and the
future of both.
Huyen, N. (2003). Learning vocabulary through games. The Effectiveness of Learning Vocabulary
Through Games.
Mediavine. (2019, March 17). Icebreakers for Small Groups. Retrieved from Ice Breakers Idea:
https://icebreakerideas.com/icebreakers-small-groups/
Mind Tools Corporate team. (2016). Ice Breakers - Communication skill. Retrieved from
mindtools: https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_76.htm
Nuraeni, N. (2018). Speaking skills. The importance of teaching listening and speaking skills.
Peterson, D. (2018, Aug 05). Using Ice Breakers With Your Adult Students. Retrieved from
Thought Co.: https://www.thoughtco.com/ice-breakers-make-you-better-teacher-31245
Psychology Wiki. (2010). Psychology Wiki. Retrieved from wikia.org:
https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/Icebreaker_(facilitation)
Reproline. (2018). Warmups and Energizers. Retrieved from Reproline: reproline.org