Icebreakers with Microsoft Teams (Original)

Icebreakers are an excellent way to promote student interactions and to develop personal connections early in the semester, which is particularly important in blended and online courses. This guide provides ideas for icebreakers that you could implement using Microsoft Teams.

Tip: Have your teaching staff contribute to the icebreaker first to encourage student engagement.

Dream holiday destination

Students post their dream holiday destination, whether it be a country, state, city or landmark, and explain why they want to travel there. Optionally, students could also include an image. Students could be asked to give 5 star ratings to holiday destinations posted by other students that they would also like to travel to.

Create a post about your dream holiday destination:

Create a new post with the holiday destination as the header. Click on the 'A' under the post to show the editor.
Briefly describe why this is your dream holiday destination
Add an image to represent the holiday destination. Use the paper clip icon under the post.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to represent how you would feel if you were on this dream holiday.

Respond to your course mates:

Read a few other posts and give them a thumbs up.
Give a Heart or Surprise reaction to the holiday destination from another course mate that you like best.
Reply to another students post and comment on their holiday destination or ask them a question. Tag them using '@student name'.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to show how you feel about their dream holiday destination.

Dream job

Students post their dream job and explain why. Optionally, students could also include an image. Students could be asked to give 5 star ratings to jobs posted by other students that they would also like or find interesting.

Create a post about your dream job

Create a new post with the job title as the header. Click on the 'A' under the post to show the editor.
Briefly describe why this is your dream job
Add an image to represent the job. Use the paper clip icon under the post.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to represent how you would feel if you got this position.

Respond to your course mates:

Read a few other posts and give them a thumbs up.
Give a Heart or Surprise reaction to the job from another course mate that you like best.
Reply to another students post and comment on their job or ask them a question. Tag them using '@student name'.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to show how you feel about their dream job.

Favourite study space

Students describe and optionally include a photo of their favourite study space. Students could be asked to give 5 star ratings to study spaces posted by other students that they relate to.

Create a post about your favourite study space

Create a new post with the short description of the space as the header. Click on the 'A' under the post to show the editor.
Briefly describe why this is your favourite study space
Add an image to represent the study space. Use the paper clip icon under the post.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to represent how you would feel when studying in this space.

Respond to your course mates:

Read a few other posts and give them a thumbs up.
Give a Heart or Surprise reaction to the favourite study space from another course mate that you like best.
Reply to another students post and comment on their study space or ask them a question. Tag them using '@student name'.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to show how you feel about their favourite study space.

Example icebreaker topics for discipline areas

Create a post about your ......

Create a new post with the .......e as the header. Click on the 'A' under the post to show the editor.
Briefly describe why this is your ..........
Add an image to represent the ........ Use the paper clip icon under the post.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to represent how you would feel if you got this ............

Respond to your course mates:

Read a few other posts and give them a thumbs up.
Give a Heart or Surprise reaction to the ............ from another course mate that you like best.
Reply to another students post and comment on their job or ask them a question. Tag them using '@student name'.
Add a Giphy and/or Sticker to show how you feel about their ..........

Example discipline areas	Week 1 Personal to minimise concerns about a right or wrong answer	Week 2 Sharing a personal experience related to discipline area	Week 3 An evaluative judgement based on personal experience
Tourism	Name your dream holiday destination.	Name a great holiday service experience.	What was it about the service that made your favourite holiday service experience so good?
Public Relations	What are your weekend plans? What's your favourite food?	Name a company you trust.	Remember a time a company faced a crisis in the media. Was is handled well or poorly?
Journalism	Where in the world would you most like to work?	Which source of news do you trust the most?	Think of a news story that impressed you. What made it so good?
Languages	In which part of [Japan] would you most like to live?	Which is your favourite [Japanese] book/movie?	In your opinion, which aspect of [Japanese] is the most challenging?
Research methods (postgrad)	What do you hope to get from this course?	Which field of research interests you the most?	Share a [theory/paper/book] that you've recently read. What was the best aspect of the work?
Linguistics	If you could invite two authors to a dinner party, who would they be?	What most interests you about the field of linguistics?	How would you like to apply the theories we're learning in the course?