The Silent Countdown is the perfect activity if you want your group to think carefully about what is going on within a team.

The group will need to sit in a circle and everybody will need to wear a blindfold. This can be done in smaller groups of approx 10.

The challenge is for them to count to the number of members of their group.

The rules are:

1) All students must keep their blindfold on

2) Only one student can talk at a time

3) When speaking only a number can be said

4) If more than one student speaks at a time the group must start again.

5) Each student can only say one number on each attempt.

The difficulty is for the students to make a strategy without being able to talk it through.

You can make this challenge easier / harder by not allowing certain strategies. Eg: Just numbering off going around the circle

It is possible to avoid the use of blindfolds by sitting in a circle with each student facing out.

If you want to make The Silent Countdown more challenging then join all of the groups together and get them complete the challenge.