All methods
FacilitationBeginner

Friendly Flyers

This exercise promotes communication and relationship building within teams. Participants work in pairs to create paper airplanes while sharing personal insights, culminating in a playful flying contest to guess whose plane is whose based on the attributes shared.

Duration
15m–30m
Group size
6–30 people
CCBY-SA 4.0

How to run it

  1. 1

    Organize participants into pairs and provide them with paper and pens in a large space away from other pairs.

  2. 2

    Instruct each pair to build an aerodynamic paper airplane that can fly the farthest.

  3. 3

    Have each participant write down personal characteristics on the airplane's wings or inside.

  4. 4

    Conduct a paper airplane flying contest to determine which plane travels the farthest.

  5. 5

    After the contest, challenge the rest of the group to identify who each plane belongs to using the attributes written.

  6. 6

    Reveal the answers and celebrate the guesses.

  7. 7

    Continue with the planes in the order of distance flown.

  8. 8

    Conclude by highlighting that everyone has contributed and won in the activity.

Tips

  • Encourage participants to be creative with their planes and personal attributes.

  • Facilitate the guessing game in a supportive manner to ensure everyone feels included.

  • Provide clear guidance on the importance of features that contribute to flight.

Variations

You can introduce themed attributes for the planes based on specific group goals or assign different distances for additional competitiveness.

Where it fits

team building activityicebreaker exercisecommunication skills workshopretrospective activity
🪡

Plan your next workshop with AI

Workshop Weaver helps you combine methods like Friendly Flyers into a complete, timed agenda in minutes.

Try it free

Method descriptions on Workshop Weaver are original content written by our team, based on established facilitation practices. This method was inspired by work from SessionLab. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Friendly Flyers — Facilitation Method | Workshop Weaver