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From football practice to rehearsing for the school play, students work better as a team. They begin to trust each other, develop collaboration skills, and even create lasting friendships as they work toward a common goal. And nothing’s more indicative of success than happy students working toward a goal! Foster this collective learning attitude with a list of original classroom team-building activities for teens that you can use immediately.
Teen Team-Building Activities to Grow Friendships
Your high schoolers may have known each other since kindergarten, but how well do they really know each other? High school team-building activities focused on fostering friendship encourage conversation with deep questions and prompts. Start collaborating on the very first day of school with icebreakers for high school students that encourage them to work together while getting to know each other.
Group Interview
Projected Time: 1-2 class periods
Skills: Speaking and listening, collaboration
Materials: Writing utensils, question cards
Your class members may have conducted one-on-one interviews before, but what about group interviews? Divide the class into groups of 4-5, and have members take turns asking each other questions. They then quiz each other (or you can quiz them in front of the class!) about the people in their groups. Who has three dogs? Whose birthday is in December? Which of your group members is allergic to shellfish? The team with the most correct answers wins.
Speed Friendships Team Building Getting To Know You Activity
By Goodbye Home Ec Hello FCS
Grades: 4th-12th
Some students need a little more help building friendships in the classroom. Help teens break the ice with two sets of 192 question cards, each with unique conversational questions for peers to learn more about each other.
Free Back to School Icebreaker and Team Building Activity – Digital and Print
By OCBeach Teacher
Grades: 7th-11th
Standards: CCSS SL.7.1, 7.1c, 7.6; SL.8.1, 8.1c, 8.6; SL.9-10.1b, 9-10.6
Aligned to CCSS for ELA and designed to build social-emotional learning skills, this icebreaker activity encourages students to talk to each other from the first day of school (all while getting out of their seats!). Digital and print versions of worksheets prompt peers to ask new friends about spots, food, fashion, pets, and any number of getting-to-know-you subjects.
Mystery Box Skit
Projected Time: 1-2 class periods
Skills: Creativity, teamwork, speaking and listening, narrative writing
Materials: 4-5 boxes with 1-2 random objects in them
It’s one thing to work together on an assignment everyone’s planning, but what about writing a play about a mystery item? Small groups receive a box with 1-2 mystery items in it, such as stuffed animals, hats, books, or anything you can easily find. As a team, they work together to write a short skit in which their assigned item or items are necessary to the plot.
If you’re working on other literary elements, such as setting or character, you can clarify that the item should relate to those elements, too. Then have the groups perform their skits for their peers! For an extra challenge, keep the items secret until the group performs the play, and have them improvise how the item fits into their story on the spot.
Spy Hunt
Projected Time: 1 class period
Skills: Planning, teamwork, speaking and listening, collaboration
Materials: Any materials needed for a simple project
There’s a spy in your classroom! But who could it be — and which group are they in? Assign small groups with easy tasks that involve working with other groups, such as borrowing materials or building a project together. One person in one group is a spy (tell that person secretly, before class) who is trying to sabotage every other group’s progress.
Can the other groups work together to suss out the spy before their sabotage is successful? To emphasize the friendship element of this activity, consider having an entire group function as spies to subtly ruin the efforts of other groups.
Problem-Solving Activities for Team Building in High School
Engaging team-building activities for high school students use cooperative learning strategies to solve problems in interesting ways. They present an issue to be solved, the parameters to solve it (such as time and materials), and allow students to use developing teamwork skills to get the job done. Some problem-solving team-building activities for teens are designed for one class subject, while others are useful in any middle school or high school class setting.
Building Bridges
Projected Time: 1-3 class periods
Skills: Engineering, problem-solving, sketching, teamwork, speaking, and listening
Materials: Popsicle sticks, drinking straws, tape
Teamwork is all about building bridges — sometimes literally! Invite small groups to work together to design, build, and test bridges they build in class. Groups can decide if they’d like to delegate certain roles to certain group members or work together on each step.
They present their bridges to the class at the end of the project, and the bridge that holds the most weight wins. To make the activity more challenging, encourage groups to build their bridge with limited materials (such as no tape or only a certain number of popsicle sticks).
Team Challenges – A collection of team building activities
By Teaching Math by Hart
Grades: 6th-12th
Subject: Math
Put your math and teamwork skills to the test with a set of team challenges based on secondary mathematics concepts. From building skyscrapers and catapults to creating the ideal flying saucers and board games, these activities are academically challenging and engaging ways to foster teamwork in the math classroom.
Lucky Charms Rescue Mission
Projected Time: 1 class period
Skills: Engineering, creativity, collaboration, problem-solving
Materials: Bowls of Lucky Charms cereal, paper clips
Can the teams in your classroom work together to solve a puzzle with limited materials and time? Hand cereal bowls out to your groups and see who can work together to take the marshmallows out of their Lucky Charms using only one paper clip. Each person must contribute, so it’s up to the group to decide how everyone will help save the marshmallows!
Cross the Classroom
Projected Time: 30 minutes
Skills: Collaboration, problem-solving,
Materials: A tarp, pieces of paper cut like rocks
The classroom’s been flooded! Clear the desks out of the way and set up a tarp “river” in the middle of the classroom with paper stepping stones laid out on top. Students must work in groups to figure out the most efficient way to cross the river in the fewest steps. If anyone’s feet touch the tarp, the group loses a point, and if anyone gets all the way across, the groups gain a point!
Team Building Leadership Activities Games 48-Card Deck for Student Council
By Let’s Cultivate Greatness
Grades: 6th-12th
Useful for any class subject and secondary grade, a set of team-building activities for teens focuses on developing leadership and delegation. The 48 cards include teamwork strategies to implement in your classroom, games and activities to foster different collaboration skills, and a teacher overview to ensure everything goes as planned.
Outdoor Team-Building Activities for Teens
You don’t need to teach gym to get your students working together outside. Get high schoolers moving and collaborating in the sunshine with outdoor team-building activities. They’ll feel refreshed and socially fulfilled for their next classes, and their next teachers will thank you for taking them outside!
School Scavenger Hunt
Projected Time: 1 class period
Skills: Collaboration, teamwork, delegation
Materials: Clipboards and lists of school landmarks
Perfect for new students or students returning to school, a scavenger hunt invites groups to find different parts of the school by working together. Create a list of items or landmarks for students to find (such as “Central Quad” or “School Library”) and have students check off the items when they spot them with their groups. Challenge teams with more advanced items on the list, such as “A painted #5” or “A teacher wearing glasses.”
Make the Biggest Team
Projected Time: 1 class period
Skills: Collaboration, teamwork, speaking and listening, arguments
Materials: None
Which group is the most convincing of them all? After you divide your class into groups of four, have them try to convince other team members to join their group. They’ll need reasons for group members to break away, or they may risk getting added to other groups themselves! Set groups far away from each other to encourage running back and forth, as well as privacy when planning their strategies. The largest team at the end of the period wins!
Five-Legged Race
Projected Time: 1 class period
Skills: Coordination, collaboration, teamwork
Materials: Straps or yarn to bind legs together
Who needs a three-legged race when you can have a five-legged race? Give the classic game a challenging twist when you form groups of three instead of pairs of two. They choose the order they’ll stand in and strap two sets of legs together (one person will have both of their legs strapped to other people). See who can get to the finish line by working together the best!
No-Prep Team-Building Activities for Teens
Sometimes you want to build a positive classroom culture without worrying about printouts and student devices. Use these back-to-basics teen team-building activities to encourage students to work together quickly and efficiently in the classroom.
Silent Arrangements
Projected Time: 15-30 minutes
Skills: Self-control, teamwork, problem-solving
Materials: None
What happens when teens aren’t allowed to talk to each other? Challenge high schoolers to organize themselves based on an identifying factor, such as height, birthdays in the calendar year, or interests, without saying a word. They can form groups silently or arrange themselves in a line that puts them in order as long as they stay silent.
Shoe Pyramid
Projected Time: 15-30 minutes
Skills: Coordination, engineering, teamwork
Materials: Student shoes
Let high schoolers kick off their shoes with a fun and challenging group activity. Assign students into groups of four (or as equal as possible), and prompt them to take off their shoes to create the highest structure possible. They can make stacks, pyramids, or any other structure, but they can only use their shoes. The team with the highest shoe structure wins!
Count to 10, 1 at a Time
Projected Time: 10-15 minutes
Skills: Collaboration, patience, speaking and listening
Materials: None
Use this entertaining exercise in patience and turn-taking as a class warm-up or a way to introduce group members to each other. Have the whole class sit in a circle, or split into smaller groups, and tell students that they need to count to 10. One person can call out one, and another person can call out two, and so on. But if two people call out a number, they need to start over at one. Students can’t plan their order or go in order of the circle; they must randomly call the numbers out.
Creative Activities To Build Teamwork
Some teamwork activities are just more fun than others! Stoke students’ collaborative and creative skills at the same time with team-building activities for teens that use innovative materials and methods to get kids working together.
Balloon Tower
Projected Time: 1 class period
Skills: Engineering, teamwork, problem-solving
Materials: Small balloons (blown up), masking tape
If you’ve never led a class full of high schoolers building towers out of balloons, you’re missing out on a priceless teamwork opportunity. Have small groups sketch out their desired balloon towers before securing a number of balloons and tape. They construct the highest or sturdiest tower with their small balloons without popping any. For an extra challenge, let students know that if they pop their balloons, they won’t get a replacement!
Backward Pictionary
Projected Time: 30-40 minutes
Skills: Drawing, teamwork, communication
Materials: Whiteboard, whiteboard pens
Take the best team-building parts of Pictionary and bring them to a creative class session — but backward! Rather than one team member drawing a picture for their group to guess, each member of the team except one knows the prompt for the illustration. They then give the unknowing illustrator clues to draw the picture, using only shapes (such as “Draw a square on the left side” or “Connect those two circles with a straight line”). When the artist guesses what they’ve drawn, they get a point!
Shrinking Ship
Projected Time: 20-30 minutes
Skills: Creativity, teamwork
Materials: Blankets or tarps for each group
Turn your classroom into a shipwreck with an entertaining game of Shrinking Ship. Split the class into small groups and give each group a tarp or blanket (their “ship”). Have them spread out their “ship,” then have all members of the group step on. If everyone made it, all groups stay in. Now have the groups fold the blankets in half. Can all members of the groups still fit? Keep folding it smaller until only one group remains.
Classic Team-Building Activities for Teens
Don’t sleep on the classing team-building activities for high schoolers! Use these fun games and activities in any class setting to encourage kids to work together and develop trusting relationships.
- Two Truths and a Lie: Students tell two true facts about themselves and one untrue fact, and team members guess which one is the lie.
- Human Knot: Groups “tangle” themselves up by grabbing the hands of people across the room, and try to untangle the group without releasing their hands.
- Escape Rooms: Teams work together on riddles and puzzles to “escape” a room before the end of the class period.
- Hula Hoop Pass: Groups stand in a line, hold hands, and pass a hula hoop down the line without letting go of each other’s hands.
- Relay Races: Take students outside for classic relay races, encouraging them to work together to win the race over groups.
- Survivor Challenge: Have groups pretend they’re on a desert island and need to equip themselves with the proper survivor tools, based on what other groups choose.
Build teams and trust with TPT
There’s no question that students feel safe in a classroom where they trust their classmates. Many high school team-building resources improve school culture, leading to better attendance, higher grades, and fewer interpersonal behavior problems in the classroom. Use these ideas to build more team-building activities for teens, and find ways to incorporate SEL activities for high school to make your classroom an even safer place for every high schooler on your roster.