People Bingo

Summary

People Bingo is an icebreaker game to get to know each other. It can be used in a variety of group situations as it is very adaptable to specific situations. People bingo helps the participants to learn about each other, while sharing a fun game experience. For the facilitator, it is important to keep in mind that it needs to be tailored to the specific group in order to fulfil its goals.

What is People Bingo?

People Bingo (sometimes “Human Bingo”, “Diversity Bingo”, “Autograph Game”) is a popular icebreaker game. Though it needs a bit of preparation, it creates many opportunities to get in touch with the other participants. As the questions are already predefined it is easy for participants to approach the others. The statements (e.g. “plays a musical instrument” or “has a tattoo” or “is vegetarian”) are personal traits, so that people get to know more about each other while playing the game. As they get to know some interesting information about other participants, new conversations later in the day or in the course are easily initiated. Below there is a scheme of a typical People Bingo (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1: Typical example of a People Bingo. Source: icebreaker ideas

If adapted right, People Bingo can be played in a lot of different settings from family reunions to children’s birthdays to company trips. It is very important to prepare the People Bingo to be fitting for the group of participants, so that at least somebody in the group will responds positively. Depending on the situation the focus can be placed more on the purpose of icebreaking or on getting familiar with each other. Naturally, the privacy of the statements needs to be very dependent on the context.

How to prepare People Bingo (for facilitators)?

Try to get as much information as possible on the group that will take part in the game beforehand. Relevant could be: Age, Education, Occupation, Special Interests, …
Adapt the categories of the Bingo to the group: You will need different categories of questions for a group of first day primary school students than for a group of Sustainability PhD’s.
Decide how many boxes per row and column you need, depending on the size of the group and the time duration you want to keep the game going. Often, 25 boxes and a time of max. 30 minutes are recommended.
Decide on the form of the Bingo. Typically, it would be four or five boxes in row (across, down or diagonal). You can also add special forms like a box shape or a diagonal X-form. A more difficult version can be the “blackout”, where every box needs to be completed.
For every signed box you need a different player (you may change this if it is a small group).
To be sure that it is a fair play, the other player must personally sign the box, when the statement is met.
Decide if the Bingo is over once the first person has met the goal or if you want to let it go on, so that there is more time to get to know each other. It is also possible to assign a time in which it is the goal to finish, so that it is less about the competition to be the first person.

How to play People Bingo (for participants)?

Cross out as many statements as possible by finding the fitting people in the room.
When the statement is true for the person you approached, the person may sign in the box so that you have it secured that you found someone. It is not valid, when there is no signature.
For every box you will need to find another person (not multiple boxes by the same person).
You can approach anyone for questions, but you also have to reply to anybody who asks you a question.
The facilitator will tell you which number of rows need to be crossed in order to win and which forms are allowed (horizontal, vertical, diagonal, special forms).
When you have the right number of rows, shout out a loud “BINGO!” and win.
The facilitator will tell you in the beginning whether the game is over after the first Bingo or if it goes on further.

Additional possibilities

If wanted, there can be an additional debriefing to share some of the experiences people had during the game. Participants may be asked what they learned about others or about themselves. It may also be interesting which boxes were especially hard to fill and which boxes were easily crossed. The debriefing therefore allows to stimulate further discussions about commonalities and diversity within the group.

References

https://www.thoughtco.com/ice-breaker-game-people-bingo-31382 (checked on September 6th, 2024)

https://www.icebreakers.ws/large-group/did-you-know-bingo.html (checked on September 6th, 2024)

https://professionals.wrha.mb.ca/old/professionals/collaborativecare/files/Resource-TeamExercise-3.pdf (checked on September 6th, 2024)

https://icebreakerideas.com/people-bingo/ (checked on September 6th, 2024)

The author of this entry is Jannis Pfendtner-Heise.