How to Teach Children to Improvise

Give each child a piece of paper with an emotion written on it. Have one person act as the host of a party. Each child comes to the party one at a time, and acts out the emotion on their paper. The rest of the group tries to guess the emotion and act it out in his own way. Take turns and after five or six emotions, choose a new host for the party.

Stand the children in a line. Ask them to say a sentence about a subject. One student says the first word of the sentence. The next child says the second word and this continues with each child. Start over with the first child and keep going. This game is more fun the longer it continues.

Have the children sit in a circle. One child will act out a movement. The person on her right asks, "What are you doing?" The first child says an action that is not what she is doing, and the second child has to act out what she just said. After he starts to mimic that action, the person on his right asks, "What are you doing?" and he must think of something else while he continues his action. Go all the way around the circle. It is difficult for the kids to say one thing and act another, but they get the hang of it before too long.

Teach the children a basic story to act out. Tell them they have to improvise the words and that they must sing everything instead of speaking.

Give the children a well known story or fairy tale. Let them know they have one minute to act it out. After they have finished, reduce the amount of time they have, and make them do it again. Start again and give them a shorter amount of time.