Theatre Education: A Resource of Practical and Project-Based Warm-ups/Theatre Games for K-12

Vegetable Game

Where we learned it: Creative Drama at NU
Ages: Kindergarten and up
Materials: None

Process:

1. Ask the students to sit in a circle.
2. Go around the circle and have everyone give himself or herself a vegetable name (e.g., zucchini, spinach, squash).  It is a good idea to periodically review who is what vegetable.
3. One person begins by saying the name of her vegetable twice, then says “calling,” then says the name of someone else’s vegetable.  The person she named then says her own vegetable name twice, followed by “calling,” and a new person’s vegetable (e.g., “Zucchini, zucchini calling spinach, spinach.”  “Spinach, spinach calling squash, squash.”).
4. The challenging part of the game is that everyone needs to wrap their lips around their teeth so that during the entire game, no teeth are showing.  This makes it rather difficult to enunciate and makes the phrase sound pretty funny.
5. If any player shows her teeth at any time, she is out.
6. The students can use any sort of vocalizations to try to make others laugh and potentially show their teeth.

Variations:

1. Instead of making people out when they show their teeth, have them share an interesting fact about themselves and then restart the game.
2. When someone gets out, have her continue to sit in the circle, but if anyone calls her vegetable then that person is out too.