Hi there!
I don’t know about ya’ll, but I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE playing games, and my kiddos did too! (Yes, I said DID…) I have stepped away from the classroom this year, and into a School Board Technology Facilitator spot! I’m loving it, but as a I was trying to write this post, and find the pictures to go with it, I ended up a little depressed. I never thought I would leave the classroom, but my administrator was moving me back up to middle school… and HELLO!!!! My name isn’t OCD in First for NOTHING! She felt she needed me in middle more than first, but I wanted NO PART OF THAT! You can click here if you want to hear THE TRUE STORY!
ANYWAY… Back to our games!
We played games ALL THE TIME! I started off buying my games through Lakeshore and other wonderful companies, but once I started my own worksheets on TPT, I realized I could also create my own games – THEN IT WAS ON!
I created Math games, ELA games, Word Games, QR Code Games, I Have Who Has games, and Spot That Word Games – just to name a few! I was ADDICTED!!!
BUT THEY HAD TO KNOW THE RULES!
So, first I would sit my kiddos in a big circle, and explain the rules of the game. I would pick the leader as my “Opponent”. We played the game a few times, and I would explain the different rules as we went through it. Then the game would become a center game. I used a lot of my games during small groups as well to help with certain skills.
WHOLE GROUP OR CENTER:
I have a ton of I Have, Who Has games, and the kids LOVE them! You can play this game as a whole class or in small group. My students actually loved playing this with 2-4 players during centers. They would pass out all of the cards and put them face up in front of them. One person would start, and they would all look for the card that would match. If the group was able to turn over all of the cards without any mistakes, they “WON!” You can click here to read more about that!
SPOT THAT WORD:
OK – So I have to say…. FAVORITE, FAVORITE, FAVORITE! Like, as in my FAVORITE OF ALL TIME!!!!!! The students absolutely LOVE this game – and I didn’t run across an adult that didn’t love it as well! It’s a bit competitive, but it’s SO ADDICTING! You can play up to 8 players, but we always only played 4. Students sit in a circle, and place all of the cards in the center. Then each student takes a card from the pile. There are 8 DIFFERENT words on each card. Students have to find their one match to the card in the middle. There’s a match for each card, so it’s really about who can find their one match before their opponents find their one match. Here’s an example below.
QR CODE GAMES:
My students also loved these types of games. This game was done a lot during rotation stations when we had time during our math block. We didn’t always use the QR codes – most of the time they just matched them up as a table group and checked each other, but the QR codes can be used during centers for self-checking. I created six different sets (one for each table) so it was always a RACE to see which table could match them up the fastest! Nothing wrong with a little bit of FRIENDLY competition!
WORD FLUENCY:
I’ve created a 36-week long curriculum that has 10-15 weekly words that help build fluency. So with the words, I created games for the students to play to build fluency. We have our board games with sentences that are fill in the blank with the words, we have fluency strips to practice the sentences, we have flash cards to practice the words and sentences, we have our I HAVE WHO HAS games to practice the words, and we have BUILD A SENTENCE games to practice fluency. You can click HERE to read all about the games and my ELA Curriculum HERE.
STORAGE:
So, I’ve spent MANY dollars at the dollar store buying up their sandwich containers to hold all of my games. But one day I found this HANDY DANDY photo holder, and OH MY GOSH! I was IN LOVE! It holds 16 games all in one case. I found my first one at Michaels, and then I bought two more through Amazon. And then a parent gave me two more at the end of the school year. I have to be honest – I have filled up four of them – that’s how many games we have in our classroom!
Here’s my affiliate link if you’d like to check it out! They have colored ones as well, but when I started buying them, they only had the clear. I think I like the clear better, though. I just make my covers colorful – so I”m happy!
