A collection of gesture-game prompts for elementary school kids: fun ideas to liven up class parties and children's gatherings.

gorilla

Animals as the theme! Here are some ideas featuring gorillas.

Gorillas are likely animals that elementary school children have seen at least once at a zoo, in books, encyclopedias, or in the media.

They also have many distinctive movements, which may make them easier to express.

In particular, behaviors like powerful chest-beating (drumming) and knuckle-walking, where they move using the spaces between the joints of their hands and feet, can offer lots of hints for kids.

Who knows—participants might come up with the correct answer right away! Be sure to give it a try.

ghost

Ghost-themed manga like GeGeGe no Kitaro and Yo-kai Watch have periodically broken out across generations.

In a sense, works like Yu Yu Hakusho and BLEACH also contain ghostly elements.

The classic ghost gesture—dropping both hands in front of the chest and saying “Uramēshiya~”—is a perfect move that even grade-schoolers in the Reiwa era understand.

It might also be fun to imitate a jiangshi (Chinese hopping vampire) by sticking both hands straight out and hopping around.

Other characters like the Cat Girl (Neko Musume) and Eyeball Father (Medama-oyaji) could make for enjoyable gesture prompts as well.

horizontal bar

These days, you’ll find a piece of equipment at every elementary school that looks like a miniature ski jump.

People who are a bit older might all wonder, “What is that?” It turns out it’s a stepping board that helps kids do a back hip circle on the horizontal bar, and children who struggle with it practice using that board.

How handy! But miming a horizontal bar might be surprisingly tough.

As a gesture, do you just hang and sway your body a bit? Doing a gesture that shows a giant swing seems hard… From the gesturer’s side, it’s a pretty frustrating prompt!

radio calisthenics

This is a prompt you can solve correctly right away if you just go through the Radio Calisthenics as-is.

For upper-grade students, it’s an easy task.

But how about the younger ones? From what I found, almost all elementary school students learn Radio Calisthenics by the time of the school sports day.

Even first graders, who may look a bit young, can do it properly! Looking into it further, though, some places nowadays don’t do Radio Calisthenics; they do local warm-up routines or traditional exercises passed down at their schools, so it’s not always Radio Calisthenics… Maybe the days when Radio Calisthenics was a nationwide summer tradition are already in the past?

jump rope

When it comes to jump rope, it’s a movement familiar to both adults and children.

It’s likely something everyone experienced as exercise or play in elementary school.

From long-rope jumping to solo tricks like double unders, there are many ways to jump, so if you represent them with varied hand gestures, people should understand what you mean.

For example, you can capture distinctive actions within jump rope—like the person turning the long rope—and incorporate them into your gestures.

Try practicing in front of a mirror.

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Hirakawa Masako (Bōkarisuto: Sakata Mizumako)

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car

Surprisingly tricky!? Here’s a prompt about “car” ideas.

It may seem simple and straightforward at first, but vehicles with steering wheels aren’t limited to cars.

Plus, some participants might answer with specific types of cars, like fire trucks, police cars, taxis, or buses.

So what kind of gestures work well to elicit the word “car” specifically? You could mime driving, trace the shape of a car with your hands, and mix in different variations.

It’s a fun prompt with lots of room for creativity!

piano

They say the number-one extracurricular activity for girls in the Showa era was piano.

I vaguely remember that everyone casually went to a piano school near their school.

By the way, these days swimming is the runaway number one for both boys and girls, with English conversation and dance also ranking high.

You can really feel the trends of the times even in kids’ extracurriculars.

The gesture of playing the piano seems like something everyone could imitate by watching others.

In fact, there might be lots of people who can play just “Chopsticks”! But without a chair, it seems tough to maintain the seated posture for playing.

baseball

They say the declining birthrate and aging population are leading to fewer kids playing baseball.

Because of that, in many places a single neighborhood can’t field a team, so they’re forming joint teams with kids from other areas.

But if kids who don’t know each other can interact, work together, and enjoy baseball, then joint teams aren’t such a bad thing.

Baseball gestures like swinging a bat or throwing a ball are relatively easy, too.

It’s a great prompt that even lower-grade kids—and of course girls who’ve never played baseball—can handle without trouble!

Goldfish scooping

Speaking of goldfish scooping, it’s a particularly popular stall at summer festivals.

Goldfish scooping is said to have started in the late Edo period; it’s a traditional summertime pastime, and in the old days people even used wire nets to scoop them—sounds easier, doesn’t it? Catching goldfish without tearing the paper on the poi is quite tricky and takes skill.

Turning that motion into a gesture can be fun, and if you do it well people will recognize it right away.

It’s one of the recommended gesture prompts, especially in the summer season.

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Hirakawa Masako (Bōkarisuto: Sakata Mizumako)

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Vision test

There’s a comedy bit by the comedian Tomonori Jinnai called “Vision Test,” and it’s really funny.

If you get tired of hunting for gesture ideas, you should definitely watch it! Speaking of vision tests, there’s that gesture where you point to a Landolt ring that looks like the letter C.

The other iconic one is covering one eye with that spoon-like occluder.

But since eye exams have gone digital lately, I’m not sure how far those old-school actions still land… It might actually be a prompt that shows a generation gap.