soft skills | icebreakers and presentation tasks...icebreakers are a great way of getting people...

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Soft Skills | Icebreakers and Presentation Tasks

Icebreaker Tasks Icebreakers are a great way of getting people talking and making them feel more comfortable in an unfamiliar environment - a presentation, a day event or a full weekend of workshops. We have found them very useful at indeed ‘breaking the ice’, improving engagement in our talks and encouraging a discussion-centered presentation, rather than a one-way presentation with no audience interaction! Here are some examples that we have successfully used in the past or some ideas that we think would work well that we will likely use ourselves in the future! 1. Interesting Questions Task

Description: On arrival, a delegate is given a card with a specific group number and a series of questions. In the waiting area or prior to the presentation/workshop starting, they will be asked to find the people in their group (i.e. those with the same group number) and ask each person in the group the set of questions on the card. They can then decide who in the group has the strongest answer! During the introduction, you can then go through each question and find out the best/funniest answer from each group. Turn it into a competition (with a prize) for some added fun! Example Task Instructions:


These questions are ones that we have used previously. Here are some other examples that you could use:

If you could choose your age forever, what age would you choose and why? If you could be in the movie of your choice, what movie would you choose

and what character would you play? If you could meet any historical figure, who would you choose and why? If you were stranded on a desert island, what three items would you want to

have with you? Would you rather have feet for hands or hands for feet and why?

2. Introduce Yourself Task (as a group)

Description: This is one of our favourites! It’s a great way of learning names (making it a fantastic way to start a day of workshops/a full weekend of lectures) but is limited to a smaller group setting of up to ~15 people. Any more than this becomes time-consuming and quite difficult! Although Martin once managed to do it with a group of 50. For this task, delegates have to add an adjective to the beginning of their name; the adjective must start with the same letter as their first name, and it should try and describe themselves to some extent e.g. Megalomaniac Martin! You would start the ice breaker by saying your adjective and name. Choosing a direction, the next person in the group would then state your adjective & name, followed by their own e.g. “This is Megalomaniac Martin and I am Smiley Sarah”. The next person in the group would then repeat your adjective and name, and the 2nd person’s adjective and name, followed by their own e.g. “This is Megalomaniac Martin, this is Smiley Sarah and I am Active Amy”. This would continue for the whole group until the final delegate has to remember the whole group (they may need prompts to remember everyone’s name so make sure you are paying attention!)


3. Two Truths and a Lie Task

Description: Delegates are put into pairs and have to tell their partner two truthful facts about themselves and one lie. Their partner’s task is to try and identify which one is the lie! In this past we have done this as a full group task and everyone voted on what they thought was the lie. 4. Introduce Your Partner

Description: Delegates are put into pairs based on who they are sat next to. Each person will introduce themselves to their partner and share some basic information and a couple of interesting facts. After everyone has done this, each pair will take it in turns to introduce their partner to the rest of the group as accurately as possible! Our recommendation is to use this with older or more confident groups, younger/less confident groups can find this one very stressful. 5. Who’s Done It?

Description: Everyone will need to write down two or three interesting or funny facts about themselves; each one will need to be written on a different piece of paper. All of the pieces of paper are then folded in half and put into a bowl (or something similar). The presenter will pull out a piece of paper and read it out to the group. Everyone in the group/room must guess who they think the fact belongs to and why they think that! 6. Pass the Toilet Paper

Description: For this icebreaker, you will need to pass around a roll of toilet paper! Everyone should pull off the number of sheets that they would usually use when they go to the toilet. The number of squares each person has taken is the number of fun/interesting facts they will have to reveal about themselves to the whole group!


Presentation Tasks Having tasks within a presentation is a great way to make it more interactive and engaging for delegates, to get them thinking, rather than just listening to you speak. It also helps break up the talk into smaller sections to help you manage your time effectively! Here are a few examples of different tasks that you might want to include within your nutrition presentations. 1. Human Quiz Description: This task involves asking a series of questions and setting a different side of the room for a true or false response, or different corners of the room for multiple choice questions (A, B, C and D). Once the question and possible answers have been read out, everyone is then instructed to move to the area of the room that they think represents the correct answer. As well as giving you the opportunity to ask some myth busting questions, asking everyone to stand up and move around the room is a great way of making it more interactive/waking people up! 2. A Healthy Day of Eating Description: For this task, group the delegates into groups of 3-5 and ask them to write down their version of the ‘healthiest possible single day of eating’. Using a non-training day helps to remove any variables that could arise with different sports or positions within a specific sport. You can then use their answers as a discussion point (e.g. get them to write on flipchart paper and collect them in to review common themes as part of the lecture/workshop to give you an opportunity to educate/encourage) and/or as a reference point to refer back to at the end of the presentation to see if they would make any changes to their original ideas! Example Slides:


3. Government Committee Task

Description: For this task, split the delegates into groups of 3-6 (dependent on the total number of attendees) and provide them with a large piece of flipchart paper & a flipchart pen. Ask each group to write down their ideas/thoughts on their top 8-10 healthy eating messages to improve the health of the whole population! This task will encourage lots of discussion around the most important messages for health and nutrition giving you lots of embedded learning opportunities to educate. Example Slide: You could adapt this task to suit a wide variety of audiences by adapting the instructions to include the following prompts to encourage more discussion!

Meal/Snack Frequency Breakfast Meal Timing Fruit and Vegetables Eggs Red Meat Water Salt Processed Foods Junk Food Sports Drinks/Fruit Juice Food Environment Food Labels


4. Tasting Session

Description: This task can often be overlooked, but it’s a great way to get attendees to try new foods and give them some recipe ideas (especially snacking ideas!) Depending on the population, you could tweak the foods/products to taste e.g. for the elderly or athletes, you could introduce the concept of protein shakes; for corporate audiences, you could introduce some high protein/low kcal snack ideas! 5. Contemporary Diets Description: This is a great task for adult weight loss groups and/or corporate clients as some of the key teaching points should be related to Calories and adherence! For this task, split the delegates into groups of 2-4. Ask each group to write down as many different diets as they can think of in a pre-determined time period (e.g. 5mins). Then use one of/some of the ideas below to take the task in the direction you feel is most suited to the group!

Ask the group to rank their diets from ‘best’ to ‘worst’ and discuss their reasoning. Take the ‘best’ diet from each group and discuss as a whole room.

Ask the group to rank their diets from ‘greatest to least amount of weight lost’ and discuss their reasoning.

Ask the group to choose diets from the list that they have followed themselves and discuss the positives and negatives of the diet in their groups.

Ask the group to rank the diets from ‘most expensive’ to ‘cheapest’ Encourage a group discussion of the common themes of each diet e.g. positives, negatives, Calories

Example Slide:


6. The Price is Right (The Calorie Version) Description: This task is based on the hit game show ‘The Price is Right’ and is a great way of increasing awareness around the Calorie content of different foods in a fun, interactive way! You could also choose to compare different macronutrients (per 100g grams) as an alternative to Calories for different audiences e.g. you might like to use protein content of specific foods for athletic populations. To deliver the task, present a food item on the screen along with its Calorie content. A second food item is presented on the screen alongside the first item and the attendees are asked to raise their hand to/shout out ‘Higher’ or ‘Lower’ to indicate whether they think the second item has a higher or lower Calorie content than the first item. For correct answers, you could run a points system for individuals, groups or the whole room! Continue to add food items until the task has ended! Top Tip: Remember to double check your presentation animations carefully so that you don’t give the answer away in the middle of the task! Example Slides:


7. Macros on a Budget! Description: This task is a brilliant one for those on a budget e.g. students, student athletes, families etc. It does require a level of maths to be successful so is something to consider! To deliver the task, provide delegates with the price of a food item and the standard portion size of that food item. From here, they will be able to calculate the cost per portion to work out which food items are the best options on a budget! You could then use this information to support the delegates with their weekly shopping list and/or meal plan! Example Slides: 8.


8. Identifying Low-Hanging Fruit Description: This task encourages delegates to think about their own diet/lifestyle and to evaluate particular situations or food choices that may be undermining their progress. This would be good to do in small groups so they could discuss their low-hanging fruit with each other and come up with simple non-tracking/habit-based changes that they could implement to improve their nutrition and health. Example Slide: 9. Calorie Calculation Task Description: This is a simple individual task, which is best used in a workshop or small group setting. Using the Mac MET BMR method, slowly work through TDEE calculations with delegates to educate and improve awareness around energy in vs energy out. Once maintenance kcals have been calculated, you could take this further by adding in exercise energy expenditure or removing kcals to create a deficit in a weight loss situation. Example Slide:


10. Matching Macros! Description: This task is great as an initial introduction to the macronutrients but does require some preparation/equipment! You will need the following:

Lots of empty food packets/packaging or Laminated pictures of a wide variety of foods or A variety of plastic/toy foods

To deliver the task, ask delegates to split a flipchart piece of paper into 3 equal sections (carbohydrate, protein and fat) or have 3 separate areas of the floor dedicated to the different macronutrients. Delegates must then match the food with the correct macronutrient. This task usually provides lots of opportunity for discussion and education e.g. biases towards junk foods being high in fat, discussions around foods that are high in more than one macronutrient, high in grams of vs Calories from etc. 11. Applying Macros to Food! Description: This practical task is great for delegates who will benefit from hitting specific macronutrient intakes e.g. athletes. Part 1: Calculating Macronutrients Split the room into 2-3 groups. Each group should then select one person from their group to calculate macronutrient requirements for. Part 2: Applying Macros to Foods Using empty food packets/packaging, delegates should collate a realistic day’s worth of food to match their macronutrient requirement e.g. if someone requires 450g carbohydrate/day, the foods selected should equate to 450g!


12. Nutritional Case Studies

Description: Split delegates into small groups and provide them with some case study scenarios. Within their groups, get them to read through the case study scenario and design a shopping list and/or day’s food based on the case study’s individual goals. Discuss the reasoning behind each recommendation by visiting individual groups/discuss with the whole group emphasising some key teaching points e.g. low kcal, high protein foods for a weight loss individual; high carbohydrate foods for a training individual; energy-dense foods for a weight gain individual etc. Example Slides:


13. Calculating Nutritional Requirements Description: This is an advanced step-by-step task designed for a workshop-based presentation (with small delegate numbers) that you could use with a group that wanted to work out their individual macronutrient requirements e.g. athletes/coaches; those that wanted to follow an IIFYM dietary approach. Part 1: Work through an Example as a Whole Group Either choose a delegate or use yourself, the presenter, as an example. Slowly work through how to calculate energy and macronutrient requirements using presentation slides as prompts (see example slides below). You could also provide handouts that delegates can write on/take home which give them a step-by-step guide to calculating their own energy and macronutrient requirements (see example handouts below). Part 2: Support Individual Calculations Following the example, give delegates time and support to calculate their own energy and macronutrient requirements based on the information you have provided and their individual goals. Example Slides:


Example Handout: You might like to create two versions of this handout for different goals e.g. one that used PRO-CHO-FAT for endurance/power/team sports athletes whereby hitting a specific carbohydrate requirement is important for performance, and one that used PRO-FAT-CHO as shown in the example for use within strength sports and the general population.


14. Be Your Own Nutritionist Description: Incorporating tasks within an athlete’s workshop such as ‘creating a day’s food’ will help them understand more about the amount and the types of food they should be consuming to suit lifestyle and training demands. Additionally, you could ask them to plan out their Calorie intake over the course of a week. This will help them see how it could look from day-to-day. You could also discuss undulating Calories to have lower and higher Calorie days!

soft skills | icebreakers and presentation tasks...icebreakers are a great way of getting people...

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