Games are fun, Candy Land, Chutes and Ladders, Monopoly, Jenga, Taboo, even Operation. But games are also educational as we know. Can we integrate them into the classroom with a purpose? Can they be used for more than a time filler or reward? How can we make these board games both informational, engaging, and content based? We all have reluctant learners or maybe a few apathetic students. How do we grab their attention? Can we create relevant, meaningful lessons that they will find more important than their phones? How can we use inexpensive toys and the imagination to bring every student into the lesson and get them excited about learning?
There are online versions of Family Feud and Jeopardy you can customize for a review. But I fond that board games are more engaging because students haven't played them in awhile and they get the memory factor. How can these games have purpose? Well the obvious ones are Monopoly or risk in a social Studies classroom. Operation in a science classroom. But what about Jenga and Taboo? there is a template on-line for Taboo where you can create your own cards. The vocabulary word at the top and all the words they can't say wen they are trying to get their partner to say the word. My students love this game but it is really only for vocabulary review.
Jenga, a tube or box of wooden blocks? This game has endless possibilities from Physics to Ecology. Stack them up into a ramp to demonstrate work using a hot wheels car, stack them high and tumble them over to incorporate force, inertia, even momentum especially if you set them up like bowling pins. These I have done in the past. But now I am teaching Life Science. How can blocks possibly be used to model Biology? I write questions on them in chalk and they have to unscramble them, or I set some sets up to play the ecology game. It is time consuming to set up, but reusable every year, and students absolutely love it.
This you can print out on-line.http://www.covington.kyschools.us/userfiles/15/My%20Files/6th%20gr%20add%20chg/Engaging%20Students%20with%20Dynamic%20Models.pdf?id=2524
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