Charades wheel

Playing charades with a wheel

1. Split into two teams of 2–6. The team generator settles who plays with whom.
2. The actor spins with the screen turned away from their own team, so only the actor sees the answer.
3. The actor has 60 seconds to mime it: no talking, no sounds and no pointing at objects in the room. A phone timer keeps it honest.
4. A correct guess scores a point. Swap teams and repeat. Play to 10 points, or until every player has acted twice.

Charades signals everyone should know

• Number of words: hold up that many fingers before you start.
• Which word: hold up fingers again to show you are acting word one, two or three.
• Sounds like: tug your ear, then act a rhyming word.
• Getting close: wave your hands toward you, meaning “keep going”.
• Start over: make a big X with your arms.

Most entries here are one or two words, so beginners rarely need the signals. Teach them before you add film or book titles.

Making it harder or easier

For kids under 7, delete the jobs and keep animals and actions: a four-year-old can be a very convincing penguin. For teenagers and adults, add a layer: after the first spin, the other team calls out a mood (“angry”, “sleepy”, “in slow motion”) to act it in.

Turn on Remove the winner after each spin so a team cannot land on something already guessed.