Tired of spending time searching for an ice breaker through books and online and then, spending even more time to redesign the ice breaker for your needs? It’s difficult to find the perfect ice breaker, that reinforces the topic of your training, to use with your group, in your setting.

You can easily develop an ice breaker that will warm up the conversation in your training class, reinforce the topic of the training session, and ensure that participants enjoy the training.
Or, alternatively, you can develop a quick ice breaker, which is just for fun and to warm up your group. You can use an ice breaker such as the five of anything ice breaker or my favorite ice breaker, if these are your goals.

You can decide the type of ice breaker that will have your desired impact in your training session.
However, the more time you invest in ice breaker participation during the session, the more important a training reinforcing ice breaker becomes. Use these tips to develop your own ice breaker.

Tips About How to Develop an Ice Breaker
•       Decide how much time, relative to the length of the training session, you have to invest in an ice breaker. Keep in mind that with adult learners, the facilitator should talk and present 60-70% of the time. Thus, your time for trainee participation, including the ice breaker, is 30-40% of the training time.
•       Figure out the characteristics, interests, and preferences of the participants for whom you want to develop the ice breaker. Different groups have varied preferences.
•       Determine the goal of your ice breaker. Is the purpose of the ice breaker to warm up the group and provide the opportunity for participants to meet each other? Is the goal to bridge the group into the topic of the training session? Is the goal of the ice breaker to allow participants to demonstrate what they know or have experienced on a particular topic?


Another easy ice breaker is speed networking. Number the participants off in twos and tell them they have two minutes to tell their partner something important about themselves. At the end of two minutes, one of the partners moves to the next partner. If you keep time carefully, this activity may enable all participants to talk with each other. (Alternatively, you can give them two or three questions to answer such as where they went on their most recent vacation.)