Teamwork Makes the Dream Work

We have heard from a lot of teams that are having teamwork struggles. We know that is probably the biggest challenge with new teams. Disagreements, lack of focus and differences of opinion about everything from the team shirt color to the research challenge topic are common and normal! That's why our ABCs of FLL Workshop had a whole session on teamwork and team building.

One thing our team has done (and other teams do, too) is bring some fun into the stressful situation. We used giant glasses to make sure everyone had a chance to speak and that everyone listened. We got dollar store glasses and made a rule that only the person wearing the glasses could speak and if you didn't have the glasses, your job was to listen! It was just the thing to make a point about respecting each other's opinions and ideas.

We'll be sharing more teamwork tips, so check back soon!

The Inventioneers Top 10 Teamwork Tips - Games

Now is always the perfect time to work on team-building activities. One of our favorites is the Tissue Game (using a fresh roll of bath tissue only!). The first time you play the game, pass around the pristine roll and ask team members to take as many squares as they like. There will be much laughter and many jokes at this point. After everyone has their desired number of squares, team members must take turns telling the team new things about themselves equal to the number of squares they selected. We have learned some cool things about our team members even after six years - we even learned that on the day we first played the game, one of our team members had driven a car for the first time in a shopping plaza parking lot, supervised by a parent, of course)!

Since everyone will know the significance of the number of squares after the first game, we recommend putting squares in envelopes and having team members choose envelopes without knowing how many squares they hold!

Have fun!!!