Proper position is important when playing telephone. If people aren’t in some sort of order, they won’t know when it’s their turn.
Alternatively, choose a word with three or more syllables, such as: extraterrestrial, planetarium, or encyclopedia. Base the difficulty of the word on the age of the audience. What might seem difficult for a 5 year old would be easy for a 12 year old. If this is for school, consider using one of the vocabulary words that you are studying. You can also use a term from a science class.
This will force the players not only to speak clearly, but to also listen carefully.
Choosing the word “dog” is probably a poor choice, even for young children. Something like “bayou” might be a better choice. Using the word “misanthropic” could be a challenging choice, and suitable for older children.
Always keep the word a secret to ensure that it ends up being changed by the game’s end. Sometimes, the word does not get changed at all by the last person. This means that the players are really good at listening (and honest about not changing the word).
Keeping the word quiet can make it more likely that it will end up being misheard and wildly different from the starting phrase.
Words that are closer will generally sound more alike or be a variation of the original word. Words that are farther apart from the original will generally have wildly different sounds and meanings. For example, you may start with the word “benevolence”. One team ends the game thinking that the word was “beneficent”, while the other team got “detriment”. In this case, the team who said “beneficent” would be closer to the original word and win the round.
If you started out with “Mary had two white cats,” the next person might say: “Mary had two black dogs. " The third person might say: “Mary had one black-and-white dog. "
Pick longer words or phrases. The more you say, the harder it will be to pass on to the next person. You might try using “Squirreled” or “Can you can a can as a canner can can a can?”. Pick words that aren’t often used. For example, “magnanimous” isn’t said often and may cause players to mishear it. Use random words that don’t have context. For example using “tower, nose, zircon” would make it much more difficult to guess what was said without the context that normal phrases would have.
