Cooperative Play - Race the Game!

My teen students had such fun playing my Zombie Apocalypse game; I have mostly used it for review - with the students producing question banks - but sometimes they just play it for the sake of seeing if they can overcome the game. Seeing them work together so enthusiastically convinced me I just had to expand the cooperative model to another game. One aspect I wanted to work on was the fact that Zombie Apocalypse takes at least 30 minutes to play, and sometimes longer depending on the many variables at play in the game (and so is best suited to one sitting). This time I wanted a game that could fill any time from 5-10 minutes upwards.

I'm happy to say I achieved my aim with Race the Game. In fact, I went one step further and created 4 different versions of the title so we can mix it up a bit as the semester continues.

Overview
The game is simplicity itself, but with that essential element of tension to keep players engaged. It is essentially another review game where - in 3 of the 4 versions - teams get to move forward one space on their track for every correct answer. For every incorrect response, the game gets to proceed along its much shorter track. The goal is to reach the finish line before the game does.
All that's needed are 2 counters (which could be coins, erasers or even bits of paper) and a set of review questions. I prefer to have students produce these as part of their revision, but sometimes I use it to review our word wall terms. If you are looking for stems or examples for your own game, here are some resources to get you started:

• Questions for All Grades from Help Teaching (Choose your level from the left-side menu.)
• Prompts for 'Bloom' Questions
• Quizzes by Category from SoftSchools
• Grammar Quizzes from Activities for ESL Students
• Questions from FunTrivia
• Freebies from TeachersPayTeachers

Cooperative Gaming - Playing Together v Playing Against

A while back, I came across the concept of cooperative gaming through the popular boardgame Pandemic. I thought the idea of having players cooperative rather than compete was brilliant, and getting students to work together toward a common goal much more conducive to positive relationships than traditional boardgames where players are pitched against each other.

Playing is how we learn to behave in life. Practising skills like listening, suggesting, discussing and so on allow us to develop positive relationship skills that have a direct connection to collaboration and teamwork.

Furthermore, when we play cooperatively, we don't just reach a goal but we do so together and this brings its own joy.

So much in school seems to be about competition as students compare scores and grades, go up against each other in sports and strive to be the 'most' in whatever arena they find themselves in. There is an over-preoccupation with 'getting ahead' of others in today's world (IMHO), and cooperative games are a great antidote to this.

A wider aspect of cooperative gaming is the link to sustainability. We have seriously worrying problems to solve at the local, national and global levels and is likely that cooperation - if anything - is the solution: we can achieve much more together than alone.

An interesting fact is that Elinor Ostrom - 2009 Nobel Prize winner - showed through her work that in many cultures across the globe, people work together to preserve the resources necessary for living. This happens without any policies, laws or authorities - it's just makes sense to protect the ecosystem of which you are a part.

While we may be lead to believe that competition is natural, many biologists disagree.  For example, Peter Kropotkin says: “competition . . . is limited in animals to exceptional periods . . . Better conditions are created by the elimination of competition by means of mutual aid and mutual support.” You may also be surprised to learn that the phrase “survival of the fittest” was not coined by Charles Darwin but by Industrialist Herbert Spencer!

All in all, the benefits of cooperative gaming are so numerous that I was sold on promoting them with my students. To this end, I created a game to go with our 'brain' (metacognitive study) unit and used the theme of zombies to
stoke their interest. The first encounter with the concept of the game confused many of my students, but after working out the gameplay, they were off! They now ask regularly if they can play it and we've worked it in as a way to review content toward the end of our units.

UPDATE: Another game I created with my mythology-mad teen son is based on Greek Mythology. I've had my secondary students play it, and they love it. One of them commented that they wished they could buy it and play at home, so I decided to list it for sale. Here's a preview. You can also click on the image below for a bigger image.

If you think you might like to try out cooperative gaming, I really encourage you to do so. While creating your own game definitely takes time and effort, you will undoubtedly find it a most rewarding process enhanced by the delight of your students as they play and realise that truly, 'Together everyone achieves more!'

Zombies Everywhere!

In my previous post, I set out my intention to create some 'zombie-themed' resources for my upcoming Learning to Learn unit. While I might not have been posting about it, I've been really busy and now I've made a start on a resource each for reading, writing and speaking and listening. While they are not entirely new, being based on activities I've used before, I'm excited that they are now in a ready-to-go format that I can simply print and provide.
My students gave me some super-helpful reviews and suggestions for improvement, so here are the results of my labours, including a freebie.

And the freebie...

What now? I recently heard about the concept of co-operative board games which has me intrigued. What a great idea for building community and collaboration! Time for some further explorations...

A Martian Sends a Postcard Home

With the long weekend, I finally got around to giving my much-neglected store some attention. Below is my latest offering on Teachers Pay Teachers.

Are you tired of reading dull prose that fails to capture the imagination? Have you had enough of the same worn-out similes and metaphors that do nothing to enliven the mind? This lesson focuses on encouraging students to write fresh and original descriptions that will stoke readers’ curiosity and capture their imagination. Make sure you share this goal with your learners!

From a reading of this popular poem by Craig Raine, students use his striking and unusual descriptions to create their own well-crafted paragraphs.

This lesson was originally created to prepare students for the imaginative / creative writing section of the IGCSE exam, but it can be used to inspire writing that jumps off the page at any level.

I have personally used this from Grade 6 to 12 with great results every time. As students submit their writing after this lesson, I actually look forward to seeing how shifting their perspective allows them to create truly different, engaging writing.

The resource includes:
-full teaching notes
-a copy of the poem (for classroom use only)
-an accompanying set of slides (in PDF form)
-game instructions and materials to get students thinking out of the box (a mental 'warm up' for writing)
-5 examples of original, imaginative writing inspired by this lesson (from my students)
-my ongoing support!

Click here to purchase this teaching pack or click here to visit my store.

Keywords: poetry, poem, martian, postcard, lesson, printable, ppt, presentation, teaching notes, instructions, guidelines, creative, imaginative, writing, igcse, gcse, ks3, ks4, ks5, raine, mixed ability, SEN, ESL, EAL, photocopiable, printable