DIY Tips for Gaming in your Classroom.

By Nina Kendall

Looking for inexpensive ways to introduce gaming to your classroom? Here are a few tips:

·   Try the Dollar Tree. The Dollar Tree has small board games for sale in the education section. The simple game boards and game pieces can easily be repurposed and adapted to other topics in your classroom.

·    Repurpose old game boards and pieces for other uses. When I moved into my last classroom, there was an old trivia game board and pieces but no instructions. One day in an effort to engage a small group in review, I pulled out the game board and created my own rules to play a simple trivia game with this board. To my surprise they asked to play again.

·   You can also design simple boards of your own with a word processing program like this one.

Got Boards? Need Game Pieces? Try these suggestions:
·   different colored pieces of foam
·   old marker caps
·   cap erasers of different colors
·   Small pieces of paper with players’ names or initials.
·   Small binder clips with decorated with paint or tape.

Like trivia games? Need more content specific cards? Design your own.

What am I?	What am I?	What am I?	What am I?
first government of the United States.	gave president power to send troops into action without declaring war	protected in individual rights	Declared independence from Britain
did not have the power to tax.	Written at the beginning of the Vietnam War	Protected individuals from aristocracy	borrowed John Locke’s ideas about individual rights and government
Was very weak - had no authority over the separate states	Allowed for escalation of war	Written in England	Written by Thomas Jefferson
Answer	Answer	Answer	Answer
Articles of Confederation	Gulf of Tonkin Resolution	English Bill of Rights	Declaration of Independence

Simple templates like this one can be used to make sets of cards. Designing the front and back of the cards will make it easier to sort and track categories of cards.
 

Want to better monitor student progress in games?
Have students take photographs of game boards at the end of play and uploads with basic notes to programs for assessment like ThreeRing.

Learning with Games of the Week: Tokaido, New World Carcassonne, The Presidential Game

By Nina Kendall

Want to help your students or children connect better to the world around them? Trying to engage in conversations about culture, politics or economics with youth? Games are a great place to start. When learning new things we try to make on of 3 types of connections: text-to-text, text-to-self, or text-to-world. Like books and movies, games can serve as a text. In this article, we look at how 3 games will help you relate your experience with games to event and concepts.


 
Tokaido is an enjoyable board game in which you travel along an imaginary road. To me it invokes thought of the Silk Road and trade and exploration in Asia. This game can help students connect to other cultures in a more concrete way. As they make their way along the road they have to make decisions about trading, visiting at temples, and eating. Their choices lead to varying levels of success. The more balance they find in their choices of activities the more success they find in the game. This game provides a point of comparison for the culture you enjoy and others you study. Help others discover the components of culture and make comparisons between what they live or have studied and what happens in the game.

 Carcassonne is game that provides you with an opportunity to understand geography and development.  In the original Carcassonne  you experience growth and development in the French countryside. In New World Carcassonne, you help  to colonize the east coast of the New World. This game combines an understanding of geography and economic decision-making to develop successful settlement. Learn what makes some places successful and others die. Connect the action to local events in your part of the world or teach students about the transformative nature of development in the past.  These games reminded me of lessons teaching how the development of infrastructure like the transcontinental railroad and the interstate system changed the development patterns of cities and states leading some to growth in some areas and decline in others.  Topics I have taught in both geography and history classes. Want to spice up your classroom or help your child connect to their history class? This is the game for you.

The Presidential Gme is a great way to explore the Electoral College and the electoral process. this game you have to use strategy to compete for vote to win the presidency. You learn to make choice about what states you work in and what states you do less work in . You gain votes and lose votes . When playing we quickly came into direct competition in large states like Texas and California. This game would help provide people with insight into the decisions candidates make as they run for President.  This game could be played in small groups or tracked over time with small groups of students acting as competing political parties. No matter how you play or who you chose to play with it is time to run for president. Will you be the winner?