Commonalities
Time Allowance: 20 Minutes
Equipment Needed: Ask the group to arrange themselves into clusters of 2‚s, 3‚s, 6‚s or 8‚s or whatever suits the mood. Give each group a piece of paper and pen.
1. The task is to generate a list of things that are common to all the people in the cluster by which you could not identify by looking at them. Ask people to come up with a specific number of commonalties or as many as they can in a couple of minutes.
Some Examples
2. Some examples that you can see don't count...wear glasses, have brown hair, have blue eyes, etc.
3. Given a few minutes, it's sometimes amazing how many commonalties people can find with each other. It's a simple way to begin learning about other people in a fun way.
4. Variations: As a means of dividing up teams or to pick partners, I'll ask a person to find a partner, someone they don't know but with whom they have something in common that is not visible. After all the people have a partner, I'll ask each pair to discuss what their common trait is. This technique can be used over and over and over.