Each captain in turn designates the member of his team who is to play next. The player goes to the pile of slips made by the opposing team, takes one, and, without looking at it, hands it to the captain of the opposing team, so that that team will know what it is he is about to act. A time keeper is appointed and, when the opposing team has finished looking at the slip of paper, he tells the player that time is in. Thereupon the player looks at his slip, and instantly informs his team with his fingers how many words there are in the thing he's going to act out. The player himself may never speak, but his teammates can ask him any questions which he must answer only by motions. First of all a good team tries to find out quickly what category the act comes under: Is it a book? Is it a play?, etc. When this is established, the player indi­cates with his fingers which word he is going to act first and proceeds to act it, as soon as he is sure his teammates have understood the number.

It is exceedingly important always to establish that the team has un­derstood and guessed correctly. This is usually done by pointing at the person who makes the correct answer and nodding the head vigorously. If the player's team takes too long to guess the word he's working on, he should shift quickly to another. A time limit is always set for the acting and guessing-anything from a minute to three-but don't ever allow longer than three minutes, or the game will be boring.

When the timekeeper calls time, the team is charged with the full limit. Score is kept by the timekeeper on how long each team takes to guess each thing acted, and the team taking the least time to complete all its acts wins.

Besides the rule that no word may ever be spoken by the player who is acting, there are other conventions which should be agreed upon before the acting starts. For instance, if a player is going to act the fourth word of the title of a play, he holds up four fingers. Someone on his team says: "The fourth word?" and the player nods that this is cor­rect. If the word is long, he may wish to act out the syllables. He then holds up one finger and with another indicates that he is going to break it into two or three parts. He then points to the top part of his finger to indicate that he's going to act the first half of the word-or to the bottom or middle, as the case may be.