The One Minute Obstacle Course - 52 Weeks of Team Building

I am so excited about the One Minute Obstacle Course! This is a challenge I would love to participate in. This is just the right kind of silly fun to facilitate real team learning! Ready-Set-Go!


The One Minute Obstacle Course
Purpose: Develops a team’s ability to rely on each other, without outside resources, to succeed and or complete a challenge. This is a great challenge to bolster trust, communication, problem solving and listening skills and simulate working under pressure or deadlines
Materials:

• Random Items to create an obstacle course or maze
• Awards for teams that complete the challenge successfully
• Poster Board or Flipchart paper and markers

Setup:

• Find an area that can be used by the team as an obstacle course or maze. A few examples are included at the end of the instructions
• Invite your team to the challenge and ask them to bring comfortable shoes. Safety comes first!

Activity:

• Divide everyone into teams. The teams can be as small as 2 people per team up to 5 people per team.
• Collect all watches, phones, clocks etc from your team or that are present in the room. You do now want the participants to have the ability to “time” the activity.
• Inform the team that their goal is to complete the obstacle course/ maze as a whole team in one minute. A team will be deemed a winner when they complete the course in exactly one minute only. Times that are less than one minute or more than one minute are considered losses.
• Give the team’s 5-7 minutes to strategize.
• Next…you may permit up to three test runs in the course per team. Do not exceed three test runs as the teams will get to play multiple times in the game.
• Start the game, run one team through the course at a time. Either you or another designated person (who is not on a team) will be keeping records of their time. You may allow the teams to attempt the course multiple times taking turns with the other teams. I recommend a minimum of three and a maximum of 6 runs. Between each run, allow the teams to re-strategize. At the end of each run, give the team’s their current time. You can always use a poster or flip chart to post the times for everyone to see.
• At the end of the course runs, review the times and select the winning teams based on who came the closest to one minute.

 
Conclusion / Debrief
To conclude the activity. Announce the winners and if you chose, have a metal ceremony like the Olympics! Stores such as Party City have these metals and small award statues for purchase at a very economical price. After the awards are given out, ask the teams a few questions to help them cement what they learned from the activity.

1. What was the most challenging aspect of the game? How did you overcome it?
2. What is one thing that happened that surprised you? How did you react?
3. What would you do differently next time?
4. How did your team make decisions on the strategies used?
5. What was the most difficult part of working with your team? Were you able to overcome it and how?
6. How much importance did your team place on watching the other teams and learning from them?

Obstacle Course
Typical courses involve obstacles the participants must climb over, crawl under, balance, hang, jump, etc. Puddles of muddy water, ropes/nets, and "no touch" restrictions are often used to make the course more difficult. Items you can use in an Obstacle Course
1.Hoola Hoops
2.Pool Noodles
3.Paper Plates
4.Balloons
5.Chairs
6.Stackle Blocks or cups
7.Ropes
8.Laundry Baskets from the dollar store
9.A Pinata
10.Small orange cones
11.Spoons and hard boiled eggs
12.A kids golf set
13.Trash Can Basketball
14.Sand or Water Pails – to carry or fill another object
15. Dominos
16.Bouncy Balls
17.Toilet Paper Toss
18.Nerf Dart Board
19.Pool Floats (big funny ones to make someone wear to increase difficulty)
20. Frisbees
 

---

the_one_minute_obstacle_course.pdf
File Size:	92 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

---