I almost always start out with a little echoing. This way they just get warmed up and refreshed on fingering, tonguing, et cetera. I start out step wise and have them watch my fingers. Later in the year, I challenge them with skips, and I'll even turn away sometimes so they can't see my fingers. This really makes them listen. I might tell them the note I'll start on, and they are on their own from there. Also, the kids love to come up and be the leader to lead the class in echoing.

I've also gotten out my melody flash cards, and we play "Recorder Millionaire"- I just made it up. A student sits in the "hot seat" and they have to play 3 cards correctly to be the millionaire. And actually, I don't even really have them use lifelines, but I suppose you could "ask the audience" for note names or a fingering or things like that. The kids love to play games. It's silly, but it's really how they learn, since they have so much of that in their everyday lives.