Community Building Activities: 8 Fun Ways to Connect

Whether you’re a teacher looking for new ways to get your class engaged or a manager searching for ideas to bring the team closer together, community building activities are a great way to get the job done. They offer a fun and exciting way to create new connections, build on existing relationships, and create common ground.

In this article, we’ll share our favorite ideas for events, projects, and initiatives that bring people together and strengthen relationships. You’ll find examples of successful community-building activities and discover tips to organize and promote these events to encourage participation.

8 Fun Community Building Activities

If you want to foster camaraderie in the classroom or create better connections with your remote team, community building activities can help you reach your goals and make the process fun. From silly games that are sure to entertain middle school classes to simple activities that elementary students can do, there’s something for everyone on this list. Plus, you’ll find fun and challenging ideas for adults that you can use in the office to strengthen relationships. Here are some of the best community building activities to try today!

1. Scavenger Hunt

One of our favorite group activities is the scavenger hunt. It’s incredibly easy to plan and you can customize it to make it relevant to what you’re working on in the office or classroom. Plus, high school students will love the opportunity to get out of the classroom and adults will also enjoy ditching the home or work office to get some fresh air. Get started by picking a theme, which can be something you’ve been teaching in class or a fun motif. 

Some popular scavenger hunt themes include:

• Pirate treasure hunt
• Travel 
• Beach 
• City
• Art and museum 
• Neighborhoods
• Books

Once you have a theme, you can create clues to match and print out clue cards for each person to use. For example, if you’re doing a city-themed scavenger hunt, create a list of sights to see (a popular museum, famous restaurant, or local park). You can include clipart imagery of each one or use famous landmarks like the skyline to match the theme. Ask participants to take a photo in front of each location. The first person who finishes wins!

Can’t do this fun team building activity in person? Instead of printing clues on sheets of paper, use an online tool like Actionbound to create digital scavenger hunts for remote teams.

2. The Human Knot

While you can’t do this activity remotely, it’s a great game for in-person office environments and classrooms or team retreats. Have your team members or students stand in a circle, shoulder to shoulder. If you have a lot of people participating, divide them into small groups of 10  to 12 people. Ask them to raise their right hand, reach across, and grab the hand of someone on the opposite side of the circle.

Next, ask them to repeat this with their left hand, making sure to grab the hand of a different person. Now the fun starts! The team will work together to untangle themselves without breaking their hands apart.

3. Marshmallow Challenge

If you manage a design or product team, this team building activity lets them put their skills to the test. It’s also a great activity for classroom communities and office teams that want to try something a little different.

Divide the participants into groups of four to five people. Give each team 20 sticks of dry spaghetti, one marshmallow, 1 yard of string, and tape. Set the clock for 20 minutes and tell teams to build the best freestanding structure they can in that time frame. They’ll need to use creative thinking and problem-solving skills to get the job done.

Alternatively, you can use other supplies like popsicle sticks and glue. Additional options include toothpicks and clay or kid’s toy blocks. Assign a panel of judges to decide the winner or vote together to pick the best structure.

4. Trivia

Get the whole group together to play a rousing game of trivia. The best part of this team building exercise is you can easily customize it to suit your team’s needs. Choose office-related questions if you’re playing this game with colleagues. Fun questions could include:

• Which team member is a twin?
• Which 3 team members were born in another country?
• Which person’s first job was at a restaurant?
• How many people in the room have tattoos?

For classrooms, you can help learners have fun and build connections by referencing recent material you’ve covered. You can also make it fun by mixing together random facts on everything from dinosaurs to mathematicians. Make it more engaging by inviting participants up to the whiteboard to create their own trivia questions.

This is a fun way of building a sense of community since people can see who is similar to them and what they share in common. It’s also a great icebreaker since team members get to learn things they normally wouldn’t in an office environment.

5. Shout Outs

While this isn’t technically a team building game, it’s a nice way to build positivity and foster a sense of community within the team, rather than just top-down. The goal of this activity is to give props and accolades to individuals when they do something well. You can set out a bell in your classroom and invite students to ring it when they want to praise another classmate for doing a good job.

For office environments, you can invite coworkers to ring a cowbell and announce a win that another person played a key role in. For remote teams, you can set time aside on a monthly company call to do quick shout-outs.

6. Board Games

Who doesn’t love a good board game? A little friendly competition is a fun way to break the ice and get group members out of their comfort zone. You can play games in the office or classroom or do it as a virtual happy hour with a tool like Jackbox Games that works on Zoom. Other fun options include Telestrations, Clue, and Scattergories.

7. Escape Room

Another fun team building activity is an escape room. It gives team members the opportunity to show off their skills and work together to reach a common goal. If you have a large group, divide them into smaller teams. You can break them into departments or increase connections across departments by dividing everyone up randomly. 

Next, choose an escape room location in your area and get to problem-solving! You’ll be given several clues and challenges that use different skills to finally escape the room within a certain time limit. These often include things like physical puzzles, logic riddles, ciphers, and number sequences. 

It’s a great way to build communication skills and encourage teamwork since everyone can contribute. Make it even more fun by sending out digital invitations to your team members. You can ask them to play into the theme by wearing a team costume and tell them where and when to meet to start the hunt.

8. Morning Meeting

The goal of this activity is to set time aside so everyone can get to know each other or chat casually before diving into deeper work. You can schedule these as part of daily or weekly meetings without a lot of effort. Simply allocate 5-10 minutes at the start of the meeting so coworkers or classmates can chat freely. 

They can discuss their weekends, check in after a big project or discuss current events. You can let the conversation develop freely or guide it by creating a new question for everyone to answer. These can be things like:

• What was your favorite subject in high school?
• What animal would you be and why?
• What famous person, dead or alive, would you want to have breakfast with?
• What’s your favorite fragrance?

Pick one person to answer first and let them hand the discussion off to the next person. This activity is a great way to kick off the school year or keep things exciting on remote teams where you don’t get as much time to chat by the water cooler.

Connect With These Fun Ideas

With these community building activities, you can foster connections and deepen existing relationships. Whether you’re a teacher leading a classroom, a manager heading up a team, or someone looking for ways to develop communities as fundraising initiatives, these games are a fun way to reach your goals.

Planning a more elaborate gathering like a team-building offsite? Browse our selection of business invitations to easily let guests know about the big event. You’ll find customizable designs in various themes and styles to fit the tone of your function.

For more ideas, continue browsing our Stationers blog. You’ll discover ideas to connect with your team and find ways to celebrate milestones with fun parties.