Games are multi-sensory, using touch, color, and sound to engage and stimulate players’ minds and bodies. Using games, which include all of the aforementioned memory-boosters, to practice new skills can take learning to that next level.įirst, games provide for repetition, and unlike the traditional worksheet, well-designed games give students immediate feedback. Now, take that same lesson, add a few techniques proven to aid the retention of knowledge–repetition, use of multiple formats, and emotional engagement–and those new ideas become truly unforgettable. It’s not that the original lesson failed the information you taught just didn’t transition from working memory to long-term memory. Fast-forward a few weeks (let’s call it “test day”), and students now appear to be struggling with a concept you were sure they had already mastered. It is engaging, students readily grasp the new information and demonstrate their understanding by applying it to the task at hand. Posted in Games Game-Changer: Practice Disguised as Play If you’re looking for a low-prep, high-value vocabulary activity to add to your teaching toolbox, I heartily recommend Word Ladders. I still use it as a go-to for quick bell ringers or extension work. This scholastic resource for grades 4 through 6 is the book that first introduced me (and by extension my students) to word ladders. There are word ladder apps for the iPad like this one by Ventura Educational Systems (costs less than $1).Īccess print-ready word ladders at p. Looking for something a little more turnkey? You’ll find read-to-play online word ladders at (for grades K through 3) or. If you want to build a puzzle using specific words (or create a themed puzzle) you can generate a word ladder list on this site created by Stanford professor Keith Schwartz. You can create your own word ladders with this free puzzle-maker by. The activity is inherently fun, and students love to compare their finished puzzles with their peers’, so it’s a self-checked learning activity that requires no grading! For me, this makes word ladders the ideal bell ringer or enrichment activity for fast finishers. The first time they work through a word ladder it might take them 7-10 minutes, but as they gain experience with this activity, they can easily complete one in under five minutes. I let them work with a partner, so students engage one another in dialogue about the target words and definitions (a sneaky way to add an auditory learning component). Then we progress to five- and six-word ladders. I start them out with four-word puzzles, until they get the hang of it. Here are some word ladders I created for my 6 th grade intensive reading classes (where every day either begins or ends with vocabulary practice). More advanced puzzles use longer words with more challenging vocabulary, like halved… halted… halter… falter… filter… and so on. The simplest puzzles, suitable for younger children or ELLs, involve just three- or four- letter words and have fewer rungs, or words, moving through words like walk… talk…tale… and tile. Using the given clue for each word, players must change just one letter to form a new word that satisfies the given definition or clue. In fact, each word shares all but one letter with the word immediately above or below it. Word ladders challenge players to identify a string of words all having the same number of letters. The word ladder is another brain-building activity involving word play. Word searches and crossword puzzles reinforce spelling skills, and if you use word definitions as clues rather than giving students a word bank, it aids retention of new vocabulary and encourages critical thinking. Word games are a wonderful way to incorporate vocabulary activities into your classroom.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |