Playing games in the classroom is one of my favorite things to do. In fact, it’s my goal to have every activity in my classroom by my tenth year of teaching be some sort of game. Why, you ask? Games are fun, and learning should be fun. I truly believe that playing games in the classroom helps my students to learn better than just doing worksheets. There is a time and place for worksheets of course, but I want to get them out, slowly over the years. We should be tricking kids into learning by playing classroom games.
Games in the Classroom
- Trashketball
Use balls and a hoop, or literal balls of paper and a garbage can. Students answer questions, if they get them right, they get to attempt to make a basket for an additional point. My students love basketball and as a result, this classroom games really resonates with them.
- Jeopardy or a Game Show
Create a slideshow of questions. Perhaps the questions have different point values based on difficulty. Maybe they don’t – your call. I have my students buzz in on this Eggspert device, but you can also try buzzin.live. I used it for distance learning and it went well.
- Row Race
The next classroom game is no extra work for you! Take a worksheet you would normally give your students and have them work on it in a row, or group. Then students pass the paper from one student to the next, each answering one question, or fixing a classmate’s work. Most importantly, I will have the kids work in different colored pens so that I can collect the work and assess it.
- Quizlet, Quizzizz, Kahoot
Curate what you can! Most of these sites have activities made by other teachers you can “steal” or modify. Totally better than starting from scratch, however you absolutely can! I personally love Quizlet Live, but my school is 1:1, which helps with the ease.
- White Boards
This is one of the most easy classroom games! Ask questions, either verbal or a slideshow and have your students answer on whiteboards. Or you can take questions from your worksheet and do it this way instead. It’s just that little *extra* of picking out which color marker the kids will use that will turn this into a game instead of a boring worksheet.
- Board Games
I have some questions I put into a grid and cut out into cards. The kids play in small groups using this free printable game board. It’s a way to trick the students into learning, although it’s just a touch extra work, copying and pasting those questions.
- Connect Four
One of my favorite games in the classroom is connect four. First, drop your worksheet questions into a grid. Next, have students answer them in pairs, taking turns and marking them until they get four in a row. I laminated mine and use bingo chips. This way we can use them as early finishers too! Plus I will never need to make the copies again.
- Bingo
I keep a few blank bingo boards in my classroom. Begin with 24-30 vocab words on the board, and students will fill them in however they like. Second, I read the definition of the word, and if they have the term that matches, they’ll cross it off. First to 5 in a row wins!
- Card Sorts
I have a whole blog post on these and the way I use them. My favorite way is in place of the card game spoons. They kids really LOVE IT. Check out the blog post for details.
- Escape Rooms
Escape rooms are the pinnacle to planning. They take a lot of work to put together. Like actually hours! And I really do enjoy putting them together. I found this blog post of puzzles I put inside of my escape rooms and it has been super helpful.
