Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Physical Challenges

Create Your Own Candy.  Give the team crayons and paper, and have them invent a new type of candy – one that does something that no real candy can do.  Have them share the name, picture, and a description of how it’s used.

Feed the Buckets.  Gather up seven buckets or pails, and put the name of one member of the Bucket family on each.  Arrange them however you like on the floor.  A few feet away tape down a line.  Have some plastic food, bean bags, balls, or other items to throw.  Once the Bucket family begins to starve, the players must “Feed the Buckets.”  In 60 seconds, every Bucket must be fed at least once, and every player on the team must feed one Bucket.

Find the Golden Tickets.  Place 30 or more books around the room.  Inside five of them hide a “Golden Ticket” – anything from an elaborate print-out to slips of gold paper.  Give the team 30-60 seconds to find all five tickets.

Augustus Gloop Goes Up the Pipe.  Have an inflated beach ball and a mailing tube handy.  Give the team a reasonable amount of time to deflate (not pop) the ball and send it through the pipe.

Finish the Oompa-Loompa Song.  Play the first few songs from the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie soundtrack at the beginning of the program, while the teams are forming, making up team names, etc.  (Except for the Willy Wonka song, the songs are adaptations of Roald Dahl’s Oompa-Loompa songs, using his lyrics.)  Later, when it’s time for this challenge, play a part of one song, then ask them to complete the lyric.  E.g.  “Come on, we said, the time is ripe…”  “…to send him shooting up the pipe!”  This could also be done as part of the trivia questions.

Hair Cream.  Hide tiny toys or other items inside pie tins heaped with shaving cream.  Give the team 30-60 seconds to find everything.  (Have a tablecloth under this one, and a way of cleaning up the players.)

The Inventing Room Taste Test.  Blindfold your team of Oompa-Loompas and get them to identify the flavor of a piece of candy, such as Jelly Bellies or Wonka’s own Runts.  (Other taste-testing might also work, but of course watch out for allergies and other considerations.  For example, our Muslim students cannot eat anything made with gelatin, including most marshmallows.)

The Gum Game.  Give the team a reasonable amount of time for each player to open up a stick of gum while wearing gardening gloves.  Each player should have a piece in their mouth before time runs out.

The Juicing Room.  Put down a tarp under this one.  Fill a small bowl with water and some blue or purple food coloring.  (Or real juice, but it sounds messier.)  At the far end of the play area, place a jar with a line taped on it.  Using small sponges, the players must “juice” the bowl enough to fill the jar up to the taped line in a given amount of time.

Sniffable Wallpaper (“The Snozzberries Smell Like Snozzberries”).  Get some scratch-and-sniff stickers – the kind where the design doesn’t match the smell.  Put some up on the wall, keeping track of what each type of sticker is supposed to smell like.  Then have the players scratch the stickers and identify the smells.

Good Nuts or Bad Nuts?  Print off small pictures of nuts and hide them in some plastic Easter eggs, leaving some eggs empty.  Without opening these “nuts,” the team must attempt to sort them into good nuts and bad nuts in a limited amount of time.

The Great Glass Elevator.  This requires a way of confining the teammates in a tight cluster, but keeping them mobile.  You might use a hula hoop or two; have them tie themselves together with string; or require them all to place one foot in a small, sturdy box.  (We used a see-through child’s play tunnel; we collapsed it on the floor, had three students step inside, then lifted it up so they were squeezed together and only able to move shuffling their feet.)  Whatever method you use, their task will be to move through a winding course of obstacles or even just masking tape on the floor.  The team must all remain in the “elevator” and complete the course without stepping outside the path.  Prepare the course carefully in case anyone falls.

Television Chocolate.  Inspired by Wonka’s explanation of how television works.  Assemble two simple jigsaw puzzles, with an identical number of pieces, on a table.  On another table, place the box covers.  The team will challenge one other team in this one.  Both teams must disassemble the puzzles and transfer them to the other table – one piece at a time – and reassemble them.  The first team to finish wins.

Tom Kochinski

Oak Lawn Public Library