Aggressive spelling!

I really enjoy my noisy boys on Friday afternoons, as they bring a lot of energy to the end of my week, and challenge me to come up with fresh ways to keep them interested/give them scope to bounce off each other & call each other 'stupid' - very competitive issue!

The blackboard is a fine tool for these lads, last week demanding each other 'hurry up", "write more neatly", "learn the alphabet properly", etc. We were reviewing old vocab, but while we were up I wanted to see if they were ready for a 3 letter spelling challenge. On paper, they are OK but rubbing out too much. On the board, they made it a 'death race' - first one finished (with my 'ok') clouted the others. OK, not much of a game but satisfied & motivated them!

As you can see, the spelling is working out nicely, and the confidence from this will transfer nicely to more sedentary exercises. What I like most about this class is just how much one of the boys in particular has blossomed; he used to be extremely shy & self-conscious, and burst into tears at the drop of a hat - even if I looked at him funny...not these days, and I commend him for having the stones to stick with it. Strongest reader at his age in my classes :)

Round the houses - make a meal out of a simple game!

Obviously kids will forever be wanting to 'play games' rather than having to 'study'. The nifty teacher will manage very vocal demands for a game with the need to make sure that any game is not a 'throw away' event - chewing up precious time without actually doing something...rough input of language; recycling vocab/grammar or dialogues; generating a need to read; interacting with peers; coping with losing too!

Just before the holidays we had a super hot, humid day & any text book work would have head heads lolling in no time. I love this little board game because there's "No English" on it - so when we open up the box and have a lot it's not at all daunting...just very colourful & no obvious 'class stuff' to get in the way of having fun.
I wasn't planning on spending so long on the game - we all know attention spans wither in the heat, and notoriously short for younger lads in particular. However, these two decided they were going to win this game, no matter how long it took!

(A teachery aside: It annoys me when teachers feel they have to explain the rules of a game first. If you do that fully, you'll need to do it in L1: pointless & difficult. Also if you do, you loose all that adrenalin rush of opening the box & wanting to play. You also paint yourself into a corner, if you want to adapt your 'rules' later eg run out of time, make sure you don't have a massive 'loser', stretch it out a bit etc. Kids cotton on quickly enough - get started asap and let them find out as you play; they'll naturally ask you questions and discuss amongst themselves, dicovering/exploring/checking theories. Strategies to actually win > great reason to play again...but then you have to remember the words you were using etc.)

This 'no English' game clearly had these two thinking hard - and being much more stroppy with each other about completing a full question or answer than I usually am (and I do insist children produce more than monosyllabic responses), and picking on each others' pronunciation or time-wasting! They used English throughout to manage the game - 'my turn/your turn/miss a turn', 'pass the dice please', counting etc. Key vocab was furniture (which we have not studied thereby generating a need to ask me, the oracle, for new words first - then each other if they forgot afterwards) and colours/size/shape adjectives. To win, they had to move around the board and collect furniture to fill their removal van, but they could lose items to each other 'on demand' (ie asking each other then janken = rock/scissors/paper ).

The best games for me have two results for players - first past the post, but another criteria which the teacher can manipulate - in this case, whose van was fuller. Both lads therefor won, and the teacher 'lost' (again).

Vocabulary Connect 4 : Chip-O

My little lads struggled a bit last week in the heat, and I wasn't on the best form either, getting frustrated with their lack of energy/brain power!

We are all mates again now, after a 'sound' game of Chip-O. Essentially 'Connect 4', with images of vocab on the board and cards with the words on to try & match. It is more interesting not knowing all the vocabulary, as that stimulates the kids to help each other/have a need to ask me questions - ahead of their turn, importantly, to keep the game moving on & not waiting for someone 'stuck' on their 'go'.

I love this game as a reading review/phonics lab - the game itself is fun and the teacher can rarely contrive the result (usually have to 'throw' a game so students win, which is boring & often transparent!)