River Crossing

Choose this exercise

Purpose: Practice collaborative coordination, non-verbal pacing, and group resource management under physical constraints.

Use it when: Use during in-person team workshops when a group needs to examine how they coordinate shared resources and handle pacing under physical constraints.

Skip it when: Skip when running fully remote sessions, in rooms with slippery flooring, or with groups where physical balance activities pose accessibility concerns.

Group arrangement: Parallel teams of 5 to 9 people (e.g., 6 to 9 run as one team; 10 to 16 split into two teams of 5 to 8; 17 to 24 split into three teams of 5 to 8)

Timing: 25 minutes based on the 20 to 30 minute range in SessionLab.

Materials and tools

• 2 lengths of rope or masking tape (each 15 to 20 feet long) to mark riverbanks per team lane
• Cardboard squares or non-slip carpet squares (approx 12x12 inches), calculated as 1 tile for every 2 participants within each team, rounded up
• 1 stopwatch or visible room timer

Before participants arrive

1. Mark two parallel lines 15 to 20 feet apart using tape or rope to create the river lane for each team.
2. Place tiles at the starting bank for each team, providing 1 tile for every 2 members on that team.
3. Ensure the floor is clean and non-slip; use rubber-backed mats or carpet samples if the floor is slick.

Say this to open

Your goal is to move your entire team from this riverbank to the opposite bank. You must use only these raft tiles. No one may touch the floor between the banks. Rafts must have continuous human contact, or the current sweeps them away. Everyone must leave the start bank before anyone steps onto the finish bank.

How to run it

1. Explain rules and safety 4 minutes

   Form parallel teams of 5 to 9 people. Deliver the opening script. Demonstrate what counts as touching a raft, such as a hand or foot placed on the tile, and what constitutes a raft being left untouched leading to its removal. Explain that sliding tiles, running, and jumping are prohibited.

2. Plan strategy 4 minutes

   Give each team 4 minutes to inspect their tile count, assign initial roles, and plan their crossing strategy. No participant may step off the starting bank during this planning phase.

3. Execute river crossing 12 minutes

   Teams attempt to cross the river. Facilitator monitors tile contact. If a tile in the river is left completely untouched by any participant, remove that tile. If a participant touches the floor in the river, that team resets to the starting bank with their starting tiles. Everyone must leave the starting bank before anyone steps onto the finish bank.

4. Debrief the crossing 5 minutes

   Gather all teams. Invite 3 to 4 participants across different teams to share answers to the debrief questions on group coordination, tile management, and role shifts.

Debrief questions

• What strategy did your team choose before moving, and how did that plan change once people stepped onto the rafts?
• What happened when a raft was momentarily unattended or someone lost balance?
• How did communication change between the front of the line and the back of the line?

Finished output: Every team member safely reaches the opposite bank, or the group completes an agreed number of crossing attempts within the time limit.

Remote

This physical exercise cannot run online without fundamentally altering the mechanic. For remote groups, run a collaborative digital path-planning puzzle on a virtual whiteboard instead, where participants take turns moving digital tokens across a grid under turn-order constraints.

Hybrid

Hybrid execution is not recommended for this physical spatial puzzle. If running a mixed event, remote participants can act as external navigators viewing via an elevated room camera, communicating observations on unattended tiles and timing via an open speaker channel or through a designated in-room liaison.

Access and participation choices

• Participants who prefer not to balance on cardboard tiles can serve as river navigators or raft managers, passing materials and timing moves from the riverbank.
• Physical touch between participants is entirely optional; team members may hold the edge of a shared tile or step onto empty sections without grasping each other.
• Any participant may step off a tile onto the safe bank at any point without needing to give a reason.

If the session gets stuck

Cardboard squares slide across a polished floor when participants step on them.

Pause the timer immediately. Replace cardboard with rubber-backed carpet samples or apply non-slip tape to the underside of each tile.

One team member dominates all movement decisions while quieter members get stranded.

Add a brief mid-exercise pause. Instruct teams that the person currently at the back of the raft chain must call out the timing for the next tile move.

Terms used here

• raft: A cardboard or carpet tile used as an imaginary floating platform to cross the span.
• riverbank: A marked boundary line designating the safe starting point or destination.