Fun Classroom Games
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Virtual noughts and crosses
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"9 chairs required. Set chairs up in groups of 3. 3x3 Place children
into two teams and number of 1-12 for both sides. You must have even teams.
Then call out a number. That number from both teams runs to a chair and
sits down. Continue calling numbers until you get a winner. EG three of
the same team in a row or diagonal. We play this using Maori numbers and
French. A great game and the class are learning strategy, group support
and language."
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White Board Wars!
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"Students form a circle. A fluffy ball is thrown to a student. The
thrower says," One thing I like about you Matthew is that you're always
friendly in the playground." The receiver says,"Thank you, Tiana,"
and proceeds to throw it to another student. They love this and we all love
hearing good things about ourselves!"
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Digital Camera Hunt
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"My class has a language immersion course which covers French, Spanish,
German, and Japanese. At the end of every school year, we play the Digital
Camera Hunt. We make a 20-word list of common things found in the school.
We then translate all of the words into multiple languages. We don't tell
the students which of the languages the words are in. We separate the students
into 5 teams. The first group back with all of the correct pictures wins!"
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Clothes Game
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"Gather articlesof clothing, e.g. skirt, shirt, hat, gloves, scarf,
longjohns, jersey, cardigan etc. and put it in a pillowcase. Have students
stand in a circle, play some music fast and loud, and students pass the
pillow case around to the sound of the music. Stop the music suddenly and
the student holding the case puts their hand in and pulls out an item and
must put it on. Keep on doing it until all items are used, making sure a
different student gets an item. I then discuss the name, the use, and material
of the item before they put them back in the bag... a great fun game for
all levels and all ages of students."
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Classroom Pictionary
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A great way to review just about anything is to use the game pictionary. I break the class into teams of three and four students. I prepare five levels of notecards ahead of time. On each notecard I write single word concepts or definitions. Level one cards are easiest and level five cards are very difficult. Each level card translates to equal point values. For example, a level three card is worth three points.
When the game begins a team gets to pick a level card prior to viewing it. They must send one drawer up to the board. The drawer has forty-five seconds to get their team to guess the word/concept on the card by drawing. The drawer cannot use numbers, letters, or symbols, if they do, the team's turn ends. If the team guesses correctly, they receive the point value. If they guess incorrectly, the card is passed to the next team and an extra point is accumulated. So, if a two point card is missed twice, it counts as four points if that team guesses correctly. I have also added the rule that if I hear the word/concept aloud in the classroom during a teams turn they automatically receive the points. Additionally, to keep the class controlled, if another group is rude or loud they automatically lose one point.
I find this to be an invaluable activity. It engages the students in the activity.