I played this with my after school conversation class (middle school 2nd graders) today and it was so much fun.

It's inspired by the card drinking game, known as Kings to some, ring of fire to others, and "that game with the cards and death" to drunk people. But with added jenga! If you don't know those games, it's also kind of like that Japanese game where they do ridiculous things while trying to be silent in the library...

Prep is pretty basic. I wrote numbers on the blocks last year and it's been useful for many different activities.

To play this game, I wrote the following on a piece of paper (making it up as I went along). You can use any rules. The 'questions' I mention are discussion questions we came up with together in our first meeting (eg "If you had a million dollars, what would you do with it?")

1 - Answer a question
2 - Ask someone else a question
3 - Use your left hand only for the rest of the game (or, until you get another 3)
4 - Make a rule (it can be attached to a number when that rule has been destroyed, or it can be independent of the blocks, eg "No speaking Korean" or "You must always say "please" before removing a block and "thank you" when you put it on top")
5 - change seats with anyone
6 - destroy a rule
7 - use your pinky fingers only (until you get a 7 again) (this one was a lot of fun!)
8 - stand up until it is your turn again
9 - Bust a rhyme: go around the group in a circle, saying words that rhyme with the previous one. Whoever messes up gets punished.
0 - Zero to Hero: at any point (before someone else gets a 0) place your thumb on the table. The last person to see it and put their thumb on the table gets punished.

Double numbers (eg 11,22,33,44): remove your shoe. If your shoes are off, remove your sock.
Single numbers (numbers 1-9): change direction

Some awesome rules that the kids made up throughout the game were:
You must not say "Your turn"
Every time someone touches the table, say "bless you"
Don't speak during your turn
No Korean

Most of the blocks will have two numbers on them. They must do what BOTH those rules say. If it's a double number (11,22 etc) they only need to do the number rule once, and the double rule.

You can ask the kids to suggest what punishment is appropriate. Mine chose forehead flicks, back pattycake and squats for various things. The person who knocks the tower over has to rebuild it while everyone flicks their forehead (they decided that).

I was the only person to knock down the tower. They were overjoyed. My head hurts.
I think it would be awesome if people could contribute rules to this, in the comments on this thread.

And in the words of the Epik training videos, if you don't have access to Jenga blocks, write numbers on paper and put them in envelopes, use playing cards, dice...

I really like this idea! I'm gonna try this out for my camp in Jan.

Some of the rules I've played (with friends) that could be appropriate for school might be:

- You can't call anyone by their name
- You must speak in Questions only
- Before you say something you must start the sentence with something silly like,
"As I see it ____________" or "I am the king and, __________________"

- Question master was always a fun one (if you can get the kids to understand this rule)
If a certain number is drawn (usually a 12) that player is the question master until another is drawn. If the question master asks anyone a question and the other player answers, they are punished! The  goal is to not answer a question asked by the Q. Master.

- Waterfall: But instead of drinking, hold breath or do wall squats

I just did this with my camp and it went over really well! The students didn't want to stop playing.

But instead of being punished, I gave everyone seven tokens to start with, and they lost tokens if they messed up. Whoever had the most tokens at the end wins. If you knock over the tower, you lose all your tokens and the game is over!

I did rhyme time, story time, categories and count by 3s. Although my group was really good at counting by 3 in English, so I switched it to the that can't say any multiple of 3 or any number with 3 in it.