Learning disguised as play!

Graphic courtesy of  technology rocks. seriously

Learning is often disguised as play in our classroom. What better way to engage and involve our kids, all while having fun!

This week was another spelling word review week. Gah. Blech. Doesn't that sound like snoozeville?

No way, Jose!

We played several games this week to review our spelling words, and we had a blast!

HeadHunters
Each student stuck a spelling word to their noggin'. Everyone received a chart with all of the classmates' names. Then off they went, recording the spelling words stuck to their friends' heads in their chart!

WORDO
Wordo is much like Bingo! Students fill in a blank 3x3 grid with spelling words. If one of their words is drawn, they trace over it with a marker. But if a word is drawn that they do not have, they print it outside the grid on the edge. Lots of practice!

Musical Hoops of Doom
Adding "of Doom!" to any game suddenly makes it very, very exciting to a 6 year old!

We spread out hula hoops in the front entrance of the school, cranked the tunes, and boogied around! Music stopped? Hop in a hoop! Careful! If you're in a red hoop, you'll be asked a spelling word (but a friend can always lend a hand should the word be a stumper). 

KaBOOM!
This game isn't exactly spelling focused, but it reinforces students' abilities to quicky read our spelling words. KaBoom was a fun way to encourage word recognition. Pull a popsicle stick, read the word. But if your popsicle stick says KABOOM, you return your pile to the can. Who can read the most words?

But games aren't just for spelling words!


In Social Studies we are exploring ways to make fair decisions. Here is a quick chart we compiled to help us:

Bring in the games! Students were grouped into 3's, then challenged to play Connect 4. They needed to find ways to make several decisions fairly:

• Where will our group play within the classroom?
• It is a 2 player game. Which 2 students play first?
• Who will get the red pieces and who will get the yellow?
• What method will your group use to make these decisions?

To decide who would play first, these girls used popsicle sticks with
names on them and the boys played rock paper scissors

Games can certainly make learning engaging!



HeadHunters game inspired by Hurray For FDK!
KaBOOM adapted from Tickled Pink in Primary