Fun Ways To Get To Know Your Fam

So, you’ve been holed up with your family or friends through lockdown and then lockdown 2.0...but how well do you really know them? During the holidays why not take it up a notch and get to know the people you live with in a different way. Take a look at our games and questions to start the conversations…

The past

When you think about your parents (grandparents, carers, family members, friends or whoever you’ve grown up with!) it might be hard to think of them having a life before you came along...but...they did! So, why not take a delve back into the past and get to know how they grew up with some questions about their younger life. And of course, these questions don’t just have to be for the older people in your life - ask your siblings and pals too!

• Tell me about what it was like to grow up where you did?
• Where is our family originally from? How far up the family tree can you go?
• What was your favourite subject at school?
• When you were my age, what did you want to be when you grew up?
• What’s your favourite memory from when you were my age?
• What’s the most important thing you got taught as a kid?
• Do you remember your childhood home? What was it like?
• What was your favourite kind of music growing up?
• Who was your first celebrity crush?
• Did you have a nickname? How did it come about?
• What was your first job? Did you like doing it?
• What’s your earliest childhood memory?

The present and the future

Next, take a look at your time together now, and all the things that could come with a variety of questions that are designed to get you thinking, start conversations and possibly some heated (but friendly!) debates...

• What is one thing we can do together that you’d really look forward to?
• What is one thing that lights you up like nothing else?
• If you could invite anyone (alive or dead) to dinner, who would it be and why?
• If you could have ‘the most perfect day’, what would that be?
• What is the one thing you’re most proud of in your life?
• What is your favourite word and why?
• What sound or noise do you love?
• If humans were able to, would you want to live on Mars?
• What’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said about you?
• What are you afraid of?
• If you could have a superpower, what would it be and why?
• What’s your favourite thing about us?

Would you rather

If serious questions aren’t really your thing, go for the ever popular would you rather game. Pick two situations that you could find yourself in (or something completely unbelievable!) and ask away. How many of your family members will choose the same thing? What does that say about them?

• Would you rather fight one horse-sized duck, or one hundred duck sized horses?
• Would you rather play a hero or a villain in a movie?
• Would you rather win an olympic gold medal or an academy award?
• Would you rather have hands for feet or feet for hands?
• Would you rather wear clown makeup every day for a year or a tutu every day for a year?
• Would you rather have unlimited sweets or unlimited chips?
• Would you rather always have to sing instead of speaking, or always have to dance instead of walking?
• Would you rather be invisible or be able to fly?
• Would you rather be able to speak every language in the world or play every instrument?
• Would you rather shoot spaghetti out of your fingers or sneeze meatballs?
• Would you rather have a unicorn horn or a squirrel tail?
• Would you rather be the best player on a losing team or the worst player on a winning team?

Two truths and a lie

Finally, get to know just how imaginative your family can be with a game of two truths and a lie.

Go around the room and take it in turns to make three statements about yourself, two real, and one lie. The aim of the game is for everyone else to figure out which of the statements is the lie.

And remember, a good lie is one that’s ultimately believable - it’ll sound like something you actually might have done/want to do/own etc, but haven’t. A lie that’s too out there and too big will clearly sound fake. For example, don’t say “I can speak 22 languages” because that’s clearly not true. Instead, say something like “I can speak more than one language easily”. This statement is plausible enough to make people just about believe it!

Then, when it comes to telling the truth, you’ll want to do a similar thing and tell a truth in such a way that it sounds like you’re lying, even though you’re not! For example, if you’re usually quite a shy person - and everyone knows that - but you’re the one who got everyone dancing at the end of year party, that’d be a good truth as people maybe wouldn’t expect you to have done it.

Once you’ve made the statements, you can play the game two ways: the first, where everyone quickly votes on what they think the lie is as soon as you’ve spoken. Or, you can make it a bit more interesting by letting people ask you questions - this way, the imagination really has to be in play, and everyone will have to make up stories on the spot!

Have you played any of these games? What’s your favourite question to ask people? Let us know over at @NCS!