1 Computer games make maths fun in school.

An article from the online UK Guardian newsgroup about how a school in nottinghamshire is developing lesson plans and activities for the wii sport.  The console game is being used as a platform to enrichstudents learning experience in a maths class and seems to be proving very popular with students.

2. Using ICT to inspire a creative approach to writing

Homepage for the MYST writing project which sees a visually stimulating adventure video game called MYST to stimulate writing.  It is being used in over 200 schools in Kent, England.

3 .Video games valid learning tools

BBC article that talks about a study stating that video games may be more effective than reading written text.  Looks at a video game set in Victorian England and how pupils retain facts from the game.

4. Research shows video games lead to fewer mistakes on the operating table

Article by the American newsgroup USATODAY on how viddeo games are being used to improve hand eye coordination skills in surgeons.  Playing video games before going into surgery increases a surgeon’s success rate.

5 Consolarium on BBC News – Gaming in Education

Scotland’s Derek Robertson explains how gaming education projects with the Nintendo DS are motivating and improving attainment in Scottish Students.

6 Unlocking learning through video games with Clasemovil

Online technology article by Techcrunch about a South American fun learning community project that seeks to target a wide range of the curriculum using educational games.

7 Free online games develop ESL students’ language skills

Tech and learning article by Larry Ferlazzo, an teacher, blogger and materials developer.  He talks on how he has successfully incorporated gaming into the English language learning classroom with young learners..

8 How Video games changed a generation of athletes

Wired article on how an American football game win owed its winning strategy to a video game inspired move.

9. Using World of Warcraft to Teach English?

Gaming website Gamasutra interviews Edd Schneider and Kai Zeng who presented their idea for ‘ English Speaking Players as In-Game Content: New Ideas for Marketing to Youth in Asia at a Game Developer’s Conference.

10 Fast ForWord program designed to improve literacy skills

This is a reading intervention program based in the United States that claims to not only improve literacy skills but also leads to stronger memory and greater self esteem.  Have a look at some of the sample games they have.

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1 Against all odds

A game that aims to educate gamers about the problems that face immigrants and political assylum seekers. The games are divided into three stages (each stage has 4 games) that cover war and conflict in an immigrants native country,  escaping across to a border country and finally starting a new life in a new country.   Links here will take you to previous blog posts with ideas on how to use the game in a connected classroom.

2 3rd World Farmer

A strategy simulation game based on a 3rd world farm that’s great for a connected classroom note taking activity.  Use the game notes to stimulate discussion and drive a writing task for homework.  The interesting thing about this game is that it reflects the ‘real’ situation 3rd world farmers are in – you can’t win in this game!

3 Ayiti The Cost of Life

This game simulates a a farmer and families life on the farm in Haiti.  If you’ve played 3rd world farmer then this is a very similar game.  Get your learners to write an instruction manual on how to play the game.  Great for eliciting 0 conditionals and contrasting what is ‘always true’ in some parts of the world ‘won’t necessarily be true’ in others.

4 Stop Disasters

A disaster simulation game in which you choose a disaster scenario (tsunami, hurricane, wildfire, earthquake and flood) and “try to build upon an established community; providing defences and upgraded housing to prepare for the inevitable disaster.”

5 McDonald’s Video Game

A subversive look at the business process behind the fast food company ‘McDonalds.  Game takes place over four scenarios (agricultural section, the feedlot, the fast food restaurant and headquarters).  If you or your learners have ever seen ’supersize me’ or read ‘fast food nation’ then you will like this.

6 Climate Challenge

BBC commissioned game that looks at the problem of climate from a presidents viewpoint.  This is quite a serious and mature game with complex rules.  There is a tutorial that helps familiarise a player with the game play but I would only recommend this game to a more mature higher level class.  Go through the tutorial on the board but explain you want to learn how to play it as much as they do so help each other out.  When the class is familiar with the rules they could then progress to the computer room to play in pairs and later compare how well they did.

7 Disaster Watch

A look at Nicaragua and the the warning signs and possible measures that can be taken in the event of an earthquake, flood or food shortage.  Three different levels offer reading practice, some fun timed activities and a great platform for discussions.  Ask Learners to make notes, write conditional sentences or discuss possible game strategy.

8 The Peace Doves

A quiz game aimed at testing knowledge and raising awareness of nuclear weapons and the importance of the peace process.  Read the clues to identify a country and select your answer by clicking on a country on the world map.  You then launch a peace dove to that country.  Treat it as a quiz to vote on the answers in open class or as a webquest for pairs in the computer room.

9 Ars Regendi

“Ars Regendi is a browser-based political game that lets you take the reigns of your own, realistically simulated state. You will be asked to weigh in on various matters of state and – faced with a number of choices – any decision you make will have ramifications for the well-being of your virtual populace! In addition, you will be able to form alliances with other countries, initiate reforms and adjust the budget. Ars Regendi is a highly realistic and complex economic simulation that squares you off against other state leaders and puts your political and financial abilities to the test.”  Great long term project for higher level language learners with lots of reading and writing practice.

10 Darfur is dying

Darfur is Dying is a browser game about the political and social crisis in the Sudan.  The game starts with a race to and from a pumping station in the desert.  Avoid roving militia patrols by hiding (space bar also pauses the game) where you can.  Get learners to finish a short exercise in their workbooks and let a winner run a section of the game.  The next stage of the game requires a little more discussion but great for group work and collaborative gaming.

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1 Soccer manager

“SoccerManager.com is free of charge. You manage your team using your web browser. Matches are played at least twice a week.

You can log on at any time to check the status of your squad, check results and fixtures, make player transfers or just have a chat with the rapidly expanding SoccerManager.com community.”  Learners learn new vocabulary as they play, can discuss matches, strategies and their team in class.

2  Footie Manager

“You take control of a football club and compete against other managers from all over the world in your bid for the domestic championship and international cup glory.

As a football manager, you have full control over your club including managing the club finances, wheeling and dealing in the transfer markets, managing club staff and a myriad of other options that will challenge even the best budding football managers.”

Learners learn new vocabulary as they play, can discuss matches, strategies and their team in class.

3 All football games

A games site dedicated to football.  In class I showed this game page (right) in class and went through each one asking learners what they thought they would have to do.  As they predicted some very useful football vocabulary was fed onto the board and copied with some enthusiasm by the boys in the class.  Topics and vocabulary covered included the role of different players/ positions in a game, football violence on and off the pitch, the pros and cons of penalty playoffs etc  Class ended with students writing down and perfecting the best definition of “The off-side trap” in exactly 50 words.

4 Planetarium Manager

“The objective of the game is different from manager to manager. It can be to have one or more players in a national team, to aim for league or cup glory, or simply to achieve stability by raising and training your players properly. You define your own objectives. However, we can say Planetarium Manager is all about starting from the very bottom and achieving planetarium success.”  Learners choose their in game objectives and present their progress to the class in the form of a powerpoint pecha kucha presentation.  Can they justify their decisions to the class afterwards?

5 FIFA 11

This is a video of a console game that was released by the EA Sports trademark.  Turn the watching into a game.  Divide the class into teams.  Tell the teams that they take turns to say ’stop’ anytime, you’ll stop the video and they can ask the other team a question about what they can see on the video.  Award points on the nature of their questions in the following way 1 = general knowledge 2 = language 3 = Connected question (related to picture on screen).

6 Time Lines

Why not get learners to make their own timelines based on the history of football video games?  This site has a lot of information but only three pages which learners can scan read for dates and short event descriptions. e.g.

1980s Atari rules the gaming market

1981 Pele’s soccer is released (passive)

1987 Nintendo release ’soccer’ (active)

Use timelines to focus on tenses as well as vocabulary items.

7 Premier Skills

A site run by the British Council aimed at football fans of all ages with a definite emphasis on language, fun and football.  Either play games in a computer room and test your learners reading skills and football knowledge with a football rules quiz or play a game in open class and vote on the right answers while testing their football vocabulary.  There are plenty of games to play here as well as a ‘Behind the scenes‘ section providing listening practice as real footballers talk of their footballing experiences.  Definitely worth a look.

8 Freekick Fusion

Use the single player option in this game as a reward for work done well in class or as an incentive to learners to do some more boring work.  My class were doing an end of unit assessment in their coursebook which was split into a dozen sections over two pages.  The first person to finish a section,  bring me their book for me to check, got all the answers right then got to take the freekick.  Young learners loved it.

9 Dress a footballer

A great game for low levels to practice colours and clothes vocabulary (top/ t-shirt, long-sleeved top, shorts, trainers, and sunglasses).  It was also useful to use ordinals (first, second, third etc).  I played this in a connected classroom and had learners sitting at the front of the class in front of the IWB where they dictated their player to me.  Because they all had an opinion on what they wanted the player to wear this acted as a drilling activity (even if a little chaotic).  I chose learners randomly at first then if I heard any mispronunciations, I focused on that.  The activity lasts longer if you ask learners to make the worst football strip, one for their school, one for an enemy to wear, one they would wear etc

10 Football quizzes

A selection of quizzes that cover a wide range of national and international teams as well as football personalities.  You can set challenges to your learners and see who gets the best score in one particular quiz, use them for reading practice for fast task finishing football fans.  If you find a ‘quiz generator‘ or ‘make your own quiz‘ online you can use the quizzes as models to get learners to make their own.

With the FIFA World Cup starting it seems a wasted opportunity not to use football in the classroom.

Tweet this!]]> http://digitalplay.info/blog/2010/06/top-ten-football-games/feed/ 3 http://digitalplay.info/blog/2010/06/facebook-apps-chaps/ http://digitalplay.info/blog/2010/06/facebook-apps-chaps/#comments Tue, 08 Jun 2010 02:07:02 +0000 kylemawer http://digitalplay.info/blog/?p=712 Below is a list of ten standard questions you can ask learners who are on facebook followed by a list of ten facebook app game logos and more specific questions. All these games were chosen because some of your learners may be playing them as well as being easily accessible, engaging and fun for English Language Learners.

Questions

Do you recognise any of these games? Are you playing any of them? How do you play them? How well are you doing? Are any of your friends playing them? How well are they doing? What tips have you got for playing? What’s good about these games? What’s bad about these games?

Now some questions for those playing the games:

1 CAFE WORLD

What level are you at? How much do things cost? What gifts would you like? What do you get medals for? What happens when you expand your cafe? Who are your neighbours? What does your cafe look like? What’s the best cafe you’ve seen? How often do you play? What is your buzz rating? What tips have you got for playing cafe world?

2 FISHVILLE

What different types of fish have you got? Which fish are the best to have? How have you decorated your fish tank? How have you changed the environment? How much money have you got? What do you plan to do next? Who do you send gifts to? What does the music sound like? What can you buy in the store? How could you make the game better?

3 FARMVILLE

What level are you at? How have you organised your farm? Have you got any limited edition items? What animals have you got? What crops do you plant the most? Who are your neighbours? How often do you plough (plow) your crops? What happens when your farm gets overcrowded? What can you buy in the market? How would you change your farm if we had time?

4 FARM TOWN

How much money have you got? What does your avatar look like? What have you got on your farm? Have any of your neighbours got cool farms? What jobs do you do on the farm? What gifts are there? How much fuel have you got? Have you ever visited the Farm Town forum? What does the bank do? How often do you play?

5 HAPPY AQUARIUM

How do you play this game? What have you got in your fish tank? What does the music sound like? What different types of fish have you got? Which fish are the best to have? How have you decorated your fish tank? How have you changed the environment? How much money have you got? What do you plan to do next? Why did you start playing this game?

6 HAPPY PETS

What pets have you got? What does it look like? What furniture is there? What have you bought from the store? What would you like to buy from the store? How do you control ‘hunger’ and ‘cleanliness’ in the game? How many of your friends play too? How much money have you got? What are you saving up to buy? How would you like to change your pet?

7 MAFIA WARS

What jobs have you had? What different businesses are there? What can you buy at the store? What do the crates do? What badges of merit have you earnt? What can you find in the treasure chests? What’s a racket? What characters have you met in the game? What equipment have you got? What weapons can you use?

8 PETVILLE

What food can you feed your pet? What level are you at? What can you see on the game screen? What does your house look like? What does your pet look like? What is your pet wearing? Who are your friends in the game Why do you like petville? What do you buy with your money? Why do you like petville?

9 YOVILLE

What does your apartment/ house look like? What does your avatar look like? Who are your neighbours? What different places are there in Yoville? What do you do there? What jobs have you done? What can you do at the speedway? What do you spend your money on? What else can you spend your money on? What would you add to the game?

10 RESTAURANT CITY

Who are your employees?  How many have you got?  How popular is your restaurant?  What awards have you won?  What interesting ingredients are there?  What recipes have you used?  How do you earn gourmet points?  What level are you at?  What level do you want to reach and when?

These are all questions that your learners may enjoy asking each other if they are playing any of these facebook apps.  Of course, there is no reason why they shouldn’t then write and ask their own questions.  Remember – if you play any of these games yourself tell your learners about it.  Theye may be very curious about your opinions on it.

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1 The Sims teach German

The sims is one of the most commercially successful PC games, notable because of its popularity with female gamers.  This video referrences German language learning but is recorded in English and so is great for TEFL teachers to get some good ideas.

2 How to learn languages online by playing video games

Tutorial by gamer on how he sees languages can be learnt by playing video games.

3 A productive approach to video games, learning and school

Lecture by James Paul Gee on the educational implications of video games as a productive activity for schools.

4 Grand Theft Childhood

Most of us assume violent video games can negatively affect children and their behavior. After a multi-year, multi-million dollar study, Dr. Cheryl K. Olson, Sc.D. Co-Director for The Center for Mental Health and Media at Massachusetts General Hospital Department of Psychiatry speaks about the findings.

5 Manny Calavera teaches Spanish!

Overview of how adventure video games can be modified to be used in foreign language education. Demonstrates an example mixing the Spanish version of the game “Grim Fandango.

6 Pay attention

Since most of today’s students can appropriately be labeled as “Digital Learners”, why do so many teachers refuse to enter the digital age with their teaching practices. This presentation uses images and facts to convince us to enter the digital age.

7 36 Principles of learning

James Paul Gee identifyied thirty-six learning principles that are evident in the design of good video games. He also argues for the application of these principles in the classroom and here is a video from the classroom in support of this.

8 Rezzworld

A 3D video game based on task based learning that is principally aimed at native American languages.

9 Practice foreign languages in Second Life

A look at the virtual world of Second Life and how it can be used to practice foreign languages.  Second life allows you to message other avatars by text or talk to them via a microphone and headphones.

10 Video games and learning

Already covered on this blog (link above) but well worth a second look.   This video looks at the development of video games.

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1 “free online games”

Learn a bit about boolean search techniques.  An example of one of these is to put your search words in quotation marks so that your search specifically looks for a set phrase.  e.g. the title of this tip is “free online games” – games that are ‘free’, can be played ‘online’ and that are, er, ‘games’.  In fact, tip titles 1-5 here all use Boolean search methods.

2 “point and click games”

Using inverted commas for a set phrase and then adding +word means you get searches on the set phrase plus (+) the target word which helps to refine searches.   If you use the tip title here you may like to add:

+online

By the way, Point and click games require the use of your mouse to interact with the game on the screen and this rather prolific genre has some great uses in the classroom and this blog has its fair share of them.

3 “escape the room game”

A sub genre of point-and-click games the escape the room game has a rather self explanatory title.  Look for ones that use a context which contains vocabulary that is either of interest to your learners, can be easily graded to their level or simply that they are exposed to day in day out.

4 “online game walkthrough” + youtube

Use google video to find walkthroughs.  It’s interesting to see the different search parameters on the left (above).  Search for video games in video share sites, such as  youtube, and you not only get to see a game without playing it (to check the images for appropriacy, language potential, to see the game in its entirety etc) but you also get a video walkthrough you can use.  If that wasn’t enough, down the right hand side youtube will kindly list a whole list of other game walkthroughs on its site to check out.

5 “online game walkthrough” -youtube

The current trend for using screencapture to video a game being completed is so great that it is sometimes difficult to find walkthroughs that are just text.  If you want to find a piece of written text that instructs a gamer (or language learner) on how to complete a game step by step then add the:

-youtube

to take the content from this page out of the equation.

6 Delicious

If you don’t bookmark or mark as favourite any of those interesting game sites you find you should do.  Opening an account at delicious means you can not only see and tag those sites more easily but check out the sites of people who have used the same tags.  A great way to find others who may already be doing the site searching for you.

7 Tweetdeck

Open a Twitter account and then download Tweetdeck on your imac or PC to more easily see and organise your tweets.  It’s full of people microblogging about the things you set as being of interest to you.  Here’s a few columns I’ve set up to help me hear about online games:

8 Share and share alike

Create a website or a blog to collect all the games you would like to use in class in one place.  In this way you can get sites checked and approved by yourself close together and direct your learners or fellow teachers to with ease.  It also means the game, walkthrough, video walkthrough, reviews, fan reviews, screenshots and material are all easily accessible from a single site.

9 Google alerts

Once you’ve refined your searches a little and you have identified key search words you can get google alerts to scan the net for them and send you an alert each time they crop up.  Try getting google alerts on certain game types, terminology, people and events.  Scan read the summary email you receive and trash it if nothing really grabs your eye.

10 Ask The Experts

Ultimately the people who are experts in knowing what games will interest your learners are your learners.  Find out what video games they play (careful as they may differentiate between what is a ‘computer game’, ‘console game’, ‘online game’ etc), when they play them, what kind of games there are and what they have to do in each game.  Even just having ‘chats’ like this can generate a lot of English and help bridge a knowledge gap between you and your learners.

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Star Wars Personality test

This personality test consists of a list of 35 adjectives which you have to decide if it describes your personality then click on strongly disagree, disagree, agree and strongly agree. Brainstorm characters from the film in class. Ask learners to do the quiz and note down any new adjectives and ask you their meaning in the computer room. Back in class ask them to identify which character in the film the adjective best describes.

Simpsons Personality test

Brainstorm character names in class and learners write down three adjectives to describe each character. Ask learners to do the quiz and note down any new adjectives and ask you their meaning in the computer room. Back in class learners say which character they are most like and justify why they agree or disagree with the test results.

Muppets Personality test

This personality test consists of a list of 9 adjectives and personality traits to agree or disagree to. Ask learners to do the quiz and note down the questions and to ask you their meaning in the computer room. Back in class learners talk about people they know (famous/ family or friends) who are most/ least like the test’s personality traits.

Which friends character are you?

This personality test consists of 16 multiple choice questions. Chat about the characters in friends in class. Ask learners to take turns doing the quiz in pairs with one asking the other the questions in the computer room. Back in class learners can choose their own favourite tv show and make their own quiz for their class mates to do.

Which High School musical character are you?

In class ask your learners if they have seen the film, who’s in it and what are they like as people. Ask them to write down the name of the character they think they are most like. In the computer room ask them to do the quiz and write down their answers on a piece of paper as well as the character the quiz says they are most like. Do they agree? Now – can they remember and write down the questions?

Which superhero are you?

In class learners write down the name of a secret superhero. Their partner asks them questions to identify who it is (who what where when why which how questions). In the computer room learners take it in turns to ask their partner the quiz questions and ask follow up wh- questions about their partners answers. Back in the classroom learners tell a new partner what they learnt in the quiz about their partner.

Which twilight character are you?

In class ask your learners if they have read or seen any of the twilight books/ films. What do they like about them? In the computer room they do the quiz for fun – Hey there’s a lot of text in this one so why not just read it for fun? Back in class they tell you if they agree or not with the answers. Ask them to explain who the character is that they tested as.

Which videogame character am I?

Brainstorm video game characters in class. In pairs Learners can then take it in turns to describe one for their partner to identify. In the computer room they do the test in pairs but have to answer the questions by choosing an answer and saying more starting with “because . . . “. That is, before answering the question on the screen they have to justify their answer.

Which Harry Potter character are you?

In class tell the class you are thinking of a character from Harry Potter. Play twenty questions (or fifteen if you like as there are 15 in the online quiz). Back in class learners compare their answers and tell their classmates how they answered the questions.

Which lord of the rings character are you?

In class brainstorm the names of characters from the films onto the board. Then make a spidergram by adding the characters’ personal qualities. In the computer room learners do the quiz. When they have finished they can write down some more quiz questions looking at the quiz for inspiration or using the internet for research.

If other films or tv programmes are popular with your learners try finding a personality test online connected with your learners interests. Use a search engine and type in “Which (name) character am I?”

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1  Dark wood

Level Low Level Primary learners in a connected classroom

Play Read the story in your best scary voice and encourage your learners to join in.  When it comes to the ‘spot the cat’ bits in the game  get your learners to describe where the cat is or build dialogues between you and the class:

“Is it under the tree?”              “No!”

“Is it behind the tree?”            “No!”

“Is it in the tree?”                   “YEAH!”

2     Pumpkin carving

Level Low Level Primary learners in a connected classroom

Play Why not drill the language of giving directions (“up, down,  left,  right and stop”) in a fun way.  Carve an online pumpkin blind man’s bluff style.  Blind fold a learner who listens to their classmates instruct them on how to carve the pumpkin.  The class can rate their classmates pumpkins out of ten after each learner has taken their turn.   Declare the winner/s at the end of the activity.

3 Ghost Hunter

Level Any Level Primary or Juniors in a connected classroom.

Play Do you award points in class as a way of maintaining discipline?  Well what do points make? Prizes?  How about points make seconds  which they play a game?  In one really difficult class I  gave points for everything – the person who opens their books on the right page, whoever completed the exercise first and whoever got the answers right.  Points for just using basic classroom language.  I took points away just as quickly – last to open their book, not listening and not working on their exercises.  At the end of the class, count up individual’s points, convert into seconds and let the highest scorers play first.  The learners to score the highest in the game get to leave the class first.

4 Funny Halloween

Level Intermediate Juniors in a computer room

Play Done that unit from the book on clothes?  Then why not set a writing activity using a game.  As learners play this game they write down the description of what their character is wearing.  Each Learner then swaps descriptions with another learner and try to reproduce the character’s costume.  The learner who wrote the description can then judge the reproduction saying what differences there are between the reproduction and the original.

5 Garfield Scavenger Hunt

Level Intermediate and above Juniors in a computer room.

Preparation Print a copy of the walkthrough

Play Do a relay dictation using the game’s walkthrough and the game itself.  Blu-tac the walkthrough to the door in the computer room.  Learners can now take it in turns to go to the walkthrough, read and return to their ‘ game playing’ partner and relay the walkthrough information that they remember.    Learners  swap after 3 minutes.  Encourage them to ask you to define difficult vocabulary.

6 Halloween wordsearch

Level Any Level Primary or Junior learners in a computer room.

Play This is a fun vocabulary activity.  Learners note down the vocabulary and when they return to the classroom they can make a Halloween poster using the new vocabulary items for inspiration.  Ask about what they are drawing as you monitor and take an interest in what they are doing. Finally, Learners label the objects they drew on the poster.

7 Trick or Treat Bear

Level Upper Intermediate Juniors or seniors in a classroom

Preparation Print a copy of the ‘Too many clicks spoil the walkthrough‘ for each  learner.

Pre-Play Learners read the walkthrough and ask teacher about/ look up in a dictionary any of the difficult language.  Learners work in pairs to identify and cross out the repetitive language (verbs) and add a range of different verbs.   They should also expand on any of the text (e.g adding articles) when possible.

Play Learners play the game for homework using their expanded walkthrough.  They should make any changes they feel is appropriate or that makes the walkthrough better.  Next class discuss and compare the changes they made to their walkthroughs at home.

8 Halloween Escape

Level Intermediate and above Seniors in a computer room

Preparation Play the game yourself using the walkthrough to assess whether the content of this game is appropriate for your learners.

Play Learners play the game in order to create and write down their own walkthrough.  As they play they should write down where and what they did in each location.  Monitor, input language and make sure that walkthrough is being written.  If learners are playing the game and not doing the activity then they have to start the game again.

9  Trick or Treat Adventure Quest

Level Upper Intermediate Seniors in a computer room.

Preparation Print a copy of the walkthrough for yourself.

Play This is like a ‘picture dictation’ but more a ‘play dictation’.  Using the walkthrough dictate to your class how to do the game.  Monitor their screens to check on their progress and encourage them to ask questions to clarify any difficult language points.

10 Spelloween

Level Advanced Seniors in a computer room

Play Looking for a quick word building activity for your advanced learners? Then this is a nice little warmer.  Learners play individually or in pairs and when they have finished they compare their score with other the groups.  The highest scorer wins.  As a follow up activity in the classroom, how many can they remember and write down?  Check their spelling and can they describe the meaning of the words to the class?

Notes

Primaries are aged between 7 – 11 years old, Juniors 11 – 14 and Senior 14+.

Computer room = a room with enough computers stations (with an internet connection) for two learners to a computer.

Connected classroom = A classroom equipped with a computer station (with an internet connection and possibly a data projector  or electronic whiteboard).

Classroom = You, your learners, writing materials and printed worksheets and a Whiteboard/ blackboard.

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1)                 Fowl words – Seven hens have laid an egg each with a letter on.  Use the letters to spell as many words as you can before time runs out.  Great for pair work in the computer room.  One learner can use the keyboard and type the word then press the enter key while the other can use the mouse and click the letter then click the enter button on the screen.  Get them to note scores and challenge them to beat previous class scores.

2)                 Flip words – Click on the red letters to link them into words.  Great to play in open class and a real ‘shout ‘em out’ favourite.  No time limit here so it gives individuals some time to think or maybe even use a dictionary.  Stop the game and declare the winner when someone guesses the category at the top.

3)                  Boggle – Nice little three minute team activity.  Present the game in open class and get teams to shout out words.  While you type them in someone in each time should write down the words their team said.  You can decide whether you accept all words or question any you’re not sure about.  When the game ends teams can check what points they got for each word, add up their score and see who the winner is.

4)                 Bookworm – Play the web game version at the beginning of a class.  If you see any yourself you can help out by giving the class a definition to think about or a translation to look up.  Don’t forget to give the class time to read and ask you about the instructions that pop up.  Keep a record of scores to beat for when you play in another class.

5)                 Alphabet jungle – Make sure your learners understand the instructions and start the game.  You don’t even have to play it.  Learners look at the six letters and use a dictionary, a pen and a piece of paper to write down any words they can make.  When time runs out the game gives them the list of correct words and all they have to do is count how many they got right!

6)                 Scrabble blast – A fun computer room warmer or fast finisher activity.  Learners read the instructions and play the game.  It’s a lot like the popular board game ‘scrabble’. Your learners can either try to beat previous class scored records or play to beat another team head to head.

7)                  Text twist – Use the letters to spell as many words as you can before time runs out.  Great for a ‘shout ‘em out’ activity in open class.  Teams take it in turns to send a member up to the computer.  The team has to describe a word to their colleague at the computer who has to think and type fast if they are to pass the turn to the other team.  The team who has a member at the computer when time runs out is the loser.  Don’t allow time wasting – that’s cheating!

8)                 Spot the difference – An open class activity for higher levels.  Can teams spot the differences and write them all down before another team can?  You can set your own time limit with your watch to challenge them a little more.  First team to get them all written down and delivered to your table is the winner.

9)                 5 Spot difference – Can the class spot the differences and tell someone with the mouse where they are before time runs out?  Don’t let them use words like up, down, left and right – it’s a little more difficult that way!

10)             Puzzle maker – why not get your learners to make their own word game?  This site is great for recycling vocabulary and you can use word searches for lower levels or challenge higher levels with writing clues for their own crosswords.

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