Staying Connected with Friends and Family: Fun Virtual Activities to Try at Home This Holiday Season

By Megan Beiler, OTS, Grace Hoak, OTS, Abigail Peters, OTS, & Kellie Reynolds, OTS

Rush University

Occupational Therapy Department

This fall, we had the opportunity to run a six-week virtual EPIC social skills group for young adults at GiGi’s Playhouse Chicago. As 2nd year occupational therapy students at Rush University, we were looking forward to applying some of our knowledge in a meaningful way. Upon the first meeting with the awesome individuals at GiGi’s, we knew that this was going to be the highlight of our school semester!

Emily, Megan, Kellie, Abbigail, Samir, Quincy, and Grace show off their dance moves during an EPIC Just Dance challenge.

Because our group was run virtually, we had to get creative with our activities in order to address social skills while also making it engaging, educational, and fun for all participants. During our time together, we did a number of fun activities that had everyone smiling and connecting with friends. While we know these unprecedented times can make us all feel a little lonely, we are here to provide some tips on how to continue to stay connected with our friends.

To stay aligned with our group’s purpose of engaging in social skills, we selected activities that kept conversation flowing throughout each session. Some of the games and activities we did together in our virtual group included making artwork together, role playing and acting, Just Dance dance parties, playing Kahoot! and the Wheel of Conversation.

Of these activities, we found that Kahoot! was one of everyone’s favorites. Kahoot! is an online platform that allows friends to play trivia games and take fun quizzes together from the comfort of everyone’s individual homes. On Kahoot!’s website, there are many pre-made quiz topics which make it super simple to use. These fun quizzes can also open the door for great conversations among all participants. In our groups, we focused on incorporating socialization into this activity by having each person share how they responded to each quiz or trivia question and why they made that selection. We found that this sequence allowed for the conversation to carry out for story-telling and lots of laughs.

Another activity to promote socialization is the Wheel of Conversation. This online tool helps facilitate turn taking, asking questions, and responding to comments. In this activity, Wheel 1 can be filled out with conversation topics and Wheel 2 with the names of all participants. Once both wheels have been spun, the two chosen participants can engage in a 1-2 minute conversation on the specific topic. This activity is a super fun way to discuss a variety of topics, get to know our friends more, and practice developing a natural flow in conversations.

Dance parties, role playing, and acting are great activities to get everyone up and moving together! Even if we can’t dance together in person right now, we can still put on our new favorite song, like Sorry by Justin Bieber, and jam out from afar! If you don’t want to come up with your own moves, Just Dance has a number of songs on youtube for you to follow along with the dancer.

As for role playing and acting, this offers a great way to practice conversations and scenarios we may not get to on a daily basis. Whether you want to practice conversations, meeting new people at school, interacting with people at the store, or talking to significant others, role playing is a great way to practice! Acting and role playing can often make us feel more comfortable in scenarios that might seem intimidating.  This can be a fun and creative way to practice socializing with friends.

Even though we cannot be together right now, we can still find ways to connect! From the activities we have shared with you, we hope that you are able to chat with your friends, dance, act, or just spend quality time together! Have fun!