Improv is a hard sell for most teenagers. Standing up in front of classmates with no script, making stuff up as you go, probably failing in public? Nobody's lining up for that.
And yet it works. Not because it magically transforms shy kids into performers overnight, but because it forces a different kind of engagement.
Students have to actually listen to each other. They have to make decisions without workshopping them to death first. They have to be okay with not knowing what comes next.
This guide is a collection of improv games organized by the level of participation they require from students.
Why Improv Matters for High School Students?
Teenagers spend a lot of energy trying to get things right. Right answer in class. Right thing to say in the group chat. The right way to come across. Improv asks them to do the opposite: make a choice before you're sure it's correct and see what happens.
That's uncomfortable, I know, but it's also useful.
Students who do improv regularly tend to get better at speaking without a script, which matters for class presentations, job interviews, and every unscripted conversation you’ll ever have.
Students get faster at making decisions under pressure. They learn to pick up on what other people are giving them, because a scene dies if you're only listening to your own ideas.
There's also something that happens socially. Improv requires you to make your scene partner look good. You can't win by being the funniest person on stage. You win by paying attention and building on what someone else started. For teenagers who are used to competing for attention, that's a different mode entirely.
None of this means improv turns awkward kids into confident performers. Some students will always find it hard. But even the reluctant ones tend to loosen up after a few weeks, once they realize that failing in improv is part of the game, and not a reason to quit.
Warm-Up Games to Get Everyone Comfortable
The point of a warm-up is to get students out of their seats and into their bodies without anyone feeling singled out. These games work best when everyone's moving at once.
1. Zip Zap Zop
Students stand in a circle. One person claps and points at someone across the circle while saying "Zip." That person immediately claps and points at someone else, saying "Zap." The third person does the same with "Zop," and it cycles back to Zip.
The pace should be fast. When someone hesitates or says the wrong word, they're out (or just start over, depending on how competitive you want it). The game builds focus and forces students to stay locked in instead of drifting.
2. The Machine
One student steps into the center and begins a repetitive motion with a sound. Could be anything: pumping arms, clicking noises, spinning in place. A second student joins, adding a motion that connects to the first. Then a third. Keep adding until the whole class is one giant, ridiculous machine.
You can give the machine a purpose ("build me a pancake machine") or let it emerge on its own. Either way, students learn to pay attention to what's already happening and find ways to contribute without taking over.
Fruit Salad
Set up chairs in a circle, one fewer than the number of students. Assign each student a fruit: apple, banana, orange, whatever.
One person stands in the middle and calls out a fruit. Everyone with that fruit has to get up and find a new seat. The person left standing becomes the new caller.
If someone yells "Fruit Salad," everyone moves. It's basically musical chairs with more chaos. Good for burning off nervous energy at the start of class.
Count to Twenty
Students stand in a circle with their eyes closed (or heads down). The goal is to count to twenty as a group, one number at a time. Anyone can say the next number, but if two people speak at once, you start over at one.
There are no signals and no patterns. Students have to listen and sense when to speak. Most groups fail a lot before they get it. That's the point. It teaches the kind of group awareness that improv depends on.
Storytelling and Collaboration Games
Once students are loose and moving, you can start introducing games that require them to build something together. These games focus on the core improv skill of accepting what your partner gives you and adding to it, rather than shutting it down or going off on your own tangent.
The main thing to watch for here is students trying to be funny. It's the most common way these games fall apart.
Someone throws in a random word or a shock-value twist because they want a laugh, and the story collapses. Keep reminding them that the goal is to build something together, not to get the biggest reaction.
1. Word-at-a-Time Story
Students sit in a circle. You give them a title: "The Worst Vacation Ever" or "The Day the Cafeteria Exploded." The story is told one word at a time, going around the circle. Each person adds a single word. The group builds sentences together, which eventually become a full story.
This sounds simple. It isn't. Students have to listen hard, remember what's already been established, and resist the urge to steer the story toward their own idea. The story has to make grammatical sense, which means paying attention to what word should logically come next.
What it builds: Listening. Patience. The ability to let go of your own agenda and serve the group.
Common pitfall: Someone throws in "butt" or "explosion" when it doesn't fit because they want a laugh. Remind them that the story has to make sense. They're building sentences, and not collecting shock words.
2. Yes, And
This is the foundation of all improv. Two students start a conversation. Every response must begin with "Yes, and..." followed by something that accepts what the other person said and adds to it.
If Partner A says, "It's so hot in this spaceship," Partner B can't say, "No, it's actually freezing." That's blocking. Partner B might say, "Yes, and the air conditioning broke three days ago." Now you're somewhere.
Run this in pairs first, then let the class watch a few rounds. Students catch on quickly to what blocking looks like when they see it from the outside.
What it builds: The habit of accepting offers instead of rejecting them. The instinct to build rather than tear down.
Common pitfall: Students agreeing on the surface but subtly steering the scene where they wanted it to go anyway. True "yes, and" means actually following your partner's lead, not just saying the words.
3. Fortunately, Unfortunately
A storytelling game with built-in structure. One person starts with a neutral opening: "One day, a student found a mysterious key in their locker." The next person adds a sentence starting with "Fortunately..." Then the next person adds a sentence starting with "Unfortunately..." Alternate back and forth around the group.
The alternation creates natural conflict and resolution. The story gets momentum because someone's always making things worse and someone's always finding a way forward.
What it builds: Narrative instinct. Understanding that stories need obstacles and solutions, not just a series of random events. Students who get good at these games often have an easier time with playwriting exercises later, because they've already internalized how stories move.
Common pitfall: The "unfortunately" contributions become so catastrophic that the story can't recover. ("Unfortunately, the entire planet exploded.") Remind students that raising the stakes is good, but the "fortunately" person needs something to work with.
4. Story Spine
A more structured version of group storytelling. The story follows a specific template:
- Once upon a time...
- Every day...
- But one day...
- Because of that...
- Because of that...
- Because of that...
- Until finally...
- And ever since then...
Go around the circle, with each person completing one prompt. The structure forces cause-and-effect thinking. Things happen because of what came before, not randomly.
This one's worth doing multiple times. In the first round, students usually stumble through it. By the third or fourth, they start anticipating the shape of the story and setting each other up.
What it builds: Understanding of story structure. The difference between "and then this happened" and "because of that, this happened."
Common pitfall: Students completing their prompt without considering what comes next. The person saying "But one day..." needs to set up something that the "Because of that..." person can actually work with.
5. Conducted Story
One person stands apart as the conductor. Three to five students stand in a line facing the group. The conductor points at one student, who starts telling a story. When the conductor points at someone else, that person picks up exactly where the last one left off, mid-sentence if necessary.
The conductor can switch rapidly or let someone run for a while. Students have to stay locked in because they never know when they'll be called on.
What it builds: Intense listening. The ability to pick up someone else's thread without hesitation.
Common pitfall: Students who aren't being pointed at check out mentally. They're surprised when the conductor switches to them and have no idea what's happening in the story. Make the switches fast and unpredictable to keep everyone alert.
Scene-Based Games for Developing Performers
These games are the deep end of the pool. Students perform in pairs or small groups while others watch, which means there's nowhere to hide. That exposure can feel terrifying to teenagers who've spent years perfecting the art of blending in.
1. Questions Only
Players: 2 at a time (can rotate through class using elimination format)
Scene length: 1–3 minutes per pairing
Two students begin a scene where every single line must be phrased as a question. The moment someone makes a statement, hesitates too long, or repeats a question that's already been asked, they're out and replaced by the next person in line.
Give the pair a location to start (a dentist's office, a broken elevator, a school cafeteria) and let them go.
Example exchange:
- "Can I help you find something?"
- "Are you the manager?"
- "Why would that matter?"
- "Shouldn't a manager know where things are?"
What it builds: Students have to listen carefully to form their response, but they also have to advance the scene. That's surprisingly hard. It forces them to make offers disguised as questions: "Didn't you just say you were my long-lost brother?" carries way more information than "What?"
Common pitfall: Vague, deflecting questions like "What do you think?" or "Why not?" These technically follow the rules but don't move anything forward. Coach students to make their questions specific and loaded with information.
2. New Choice
Players: 2–3 performers, plus 1 caller (teacher or student)
Scene length: 2–4 minutes
Students perform a scene normally. At any moment, the caller can shout "New choice!" and whoever just spoke or acted must immediately replace what they did with something different. The caller can demand multiple new choices in a row.
Example:
- Student: "I brought you flowers."
- Caller: "New choice!"
- Student: "I brought you... a live chicken."
- Caller: "New choice!"
- Student: "I brought you the ashes of your enemies."
- (Scene continues)
What it builds: This game trains students to let go of their "precious" ideas. Most beginners cling to their first instinct because they think it was good. New Choice teaches them that there are dozens of possible moves at any moment, and that throwing one away just opens space for another.
Common pitfall: Students who play it safe by making only small adjustments ("I brought you roses" becomes "I brought you tulips"). Push for bigger swings. The third or fourth replacement should be wildly different from the original.
3. Emotional Rollercoaster
Players: 2–3 performers, plus 1 caller (or the whole class calling out)
Scene length: 3–5 minutes
Students perform a scene with a simple setup. Periodically, the caller shouts out an emotion, and the performers must immediately shift into that emotional state while continuing the same scene and characters.
So a conversation about what snacks to buy might move from "excited" to "terrified" to "heartbroken" to "suspicious". And, students have to justify each shift within the logic of their scene.
What it builds: Students learn that emotions are playable choices, not just things that happen to you. They also discover that committing fully to an emotion, even an absurd one, is actually more believable than playing things halfway. The scene keeps going, so they learn to adapt rather than reset.
Common pitfall: Students who indicate the emotion instead of feeling it. "Angry" doesn't mean yelling and stomping around; it means finding what in this scene makes the character angry.
4. Party Quirks
Players: 4–5 (1 host, 3–4 guests)
Scene length: 5–8 minutes
One student plays a party host. The others are each secretly assigned a quirk or character (a robot whose batteries are dying, someone who thinks the floor is lava, a nature documentary narrator describing everything they see). The host doesn't know who anyone is.
Guests enter one at a time and mingle at the "party" while the host tries to guess their quirks. When the host correctly identifies a guest's quirk, that guest finds a reason to leave. The game continues until all quirks are guessed.
What it builds: For the guests, this is an exercise in commitment without spelling things out. You can't just announce, "I'm a vampire"; you have to show it through behavior. For the host, it's an exercise in staying in scene while also solving a puzzle. They have to keep hosting (offering drinks, making small talk) rather than just interrogating.
Common pitfall: Guests who are too subtle or too obvious. Too subtle means the host has no chance; too obvious means there's no game. Coach guests to start smaller and escalate. Also, watch for hosts who stop hosting and just rapid-fire guess. Remind them to stay in the scene.
Final Thoughts
The first time you run these games, some will flop, and that’s normal. Students will stand there frozen, or they'll get too silly, or they'll refuse to participate at all. That's fine. The second time goes better. The fifth time, something clicks.
Improv rewards stubbornness. Play the same games until students stop overthinking them. When Zip Zap Zop becomes automatic, their brains have room for actual play. When Yes, And stops feeling like a rule and starts feeling like instinct, you've done your job.
Don't save these for "improv day." You can play them throughout the semester as warm-ups before scene work or cool-downs after heavy rehearsals. Students get better at improv the way they get better at anything: by doing it a lot, over a long time, with people they trust.
For scripts that let students use these skills in production, check out our free lesson plans and plays for high school.