Linguistic Card Game for students

When I have stations throughout the school year I enjoy adding a "fun station." I like to have it be somewhat literary or linguistic. One great game is Bananagrams and I just found out about a new one called Rewordable.

This is a great game for you to enjoy with family and friends, but more than that it's a fun way for students to take an intellectual brain break and think about words (which is key for yearbook and journalism especially!)

There are 124 cards consisting of single letters, blended sounds (ch), and full syllables (ine, age, etc).

The game starts with three cards and three tokens facing up. Then each person gets five cards. You make words with your cards and collect tokens if possible. Once you create a word, others can add to it and it turns into THEIR word.

It really is easy and we only looked at the directions twice the entire night! It isn't just the one with the most verbose vocabulary that wins. It takes some serious thinking and brain power to keep it.

Notes: If you are using this as a quickie with your students, I would not use the tokens. I would just have each student grab five cards and see what they can create.

I was lucky enough to get this as a freebie to try out in my classroom and leave an honest review. As a self declared word-nerd, I honestly love it. You can find it for sale at many big book stores (e.g. Barnes and Noble) I've also include an Amazon affiliate link below (if you purchase through this link I get a small percentage which I use for my classroom)

Four fun ways to start a new school year

Looking for a great first day of school? Here's a piece of advice. DON'T just have them read the syllabus!

Here are some alternatives for a memorable first day that gets you off on he right foot with your students and sets clear expectations for how you want the class to be.

1. Zombies!
• What is it? Yes, I said zombies! One of my FAVORITE first day of school activities is having students work in groups to defeat the invisible zombies that are taking over the classroom. Interested? Read more here.
• What do I need? This requires no technology but you do need some set up. Easily adaptable if your number of students changes. You can photocopy the reflection questions at the end or if you have a projector project them on the board. I usually upload them to my LMS (PowerSchool) and have students submit work there. If you plan on using tech I'd have some paper for back up (first days are chaotic) 
2. Have a snowball fight
• What is it? Get to gauge your students writing style, let them throw things, recycle paper and have them get to know a little about their classmates. More about the ABCs of me here
• What do I need? This requires no preparation and no technology. You can use scratch paper, computer paper, lined paper. Very easy for a first day.
3. Have them present you to their classmates
• What is it? Rather than give the students the story of your life, see if they can figure it out based on what's in the classroom. They work with one another, and ultimately present you to their peers. Full blog post. 
• What do I need? Your classroom needs to be pretty set up for this. So if they've moved you into an empty room, this isn't the best activity. Otherwise, this is a no-prep, no tech activity.
4. Do lots of little tasks
• What is it? Stations are a great option for the first day! I like to have my students do a little of everything
• Read the introduction to the first unit in the textbook and answer some basic questions. 
• Play a couple games on quizlet to see what vocabulary they already know
• Do a mini-scavenger hunt in the syllabus
• Draw a picture of their goa for this year and under it write three ways they will achieve that goal. 
• Have them do something partially related to your first unit
• e.g. World Literature usually starts with the hero's journey so I have a section where they need to pick which hero "doesn't belong" and defend it
• For example with: Iron Man, Thor, Spider Man, Batman a student could say: "Thor doesn't fit in because the rest are humans" or "Spider Man doesn't fit in because he's the youngest."
• The big fun with this one is that they CAN'T be wrong. It's practice to think critically and not be afraid to just guess.
• Create a small video about their name (blog on this to come!)
• etc.
• What do I need? It really depends on you! How big are your classes and how much time do you have? My stations are usually pretty low maintenance. Each station gets a letter with a series of related questions. Students complete each station on their own worksheet or the (usually recycled) sheets of paper provided at that station.

What do YOU do the first day of school?

Poetry stations

A snippet from students at different stations

I really hate delving into a unit immediately after break. I have foreign exchange students who usually miss the first week back, students transfer from other classes, and they aren't always back in the educational groove right away.

This year, before getting back into poetry, I spent a day helping students start their year with no regrets and learning about their poetic pasts.

Then we jump into poetic stations. I've done stations before but this time I set them up slightly differently than I normally did. Stations were throughout my classroom more or less in a circular arrangement. Students started at one station with a partner. After about seven minutes, students were able to move on. Before moving on, one student at each station moved to clockwise and the other counter-clockwise. This way they are able to work with different students throughout the day. It also meant for new students, they got a chance to meet everyone in the class (be it only for 5-7 minutes).

My poetic station this year varied a bit from last year because I built off of what they revealed in their poetic journeys.

Students racing with Quizlet!

1. Students expressed fear over needing to know literary terms. So, another Station was two of my yearbook computers set up with a Quizlet Figurative Language set. Students made note of words they didn't know, and raced their partner for the fastest time. Many students said that they were impressed by how many of these words they already knew. 
• This was effective because students expressed a fear of needing to remember all of the literary terms. This showed them that they already knew many of them as we'd used them the previous semester. The students that were less sure have access to this Quizlet and can practice on their own in free time or at home.
• This was hit or miss as far as enjoying it. Some students LOVED it because they races with their partners. If they weren't close with their partners then they enjoyed this station less. 
2. Several students said that poetry is old and no one talks like that anymore. So, one of the stations was "Hip-Hop or Shakespeare" inspired by Akala's TED Talk. Students looked at lines either from a song or Shakespeare and talked to their partner about which one was which and why. After writing down their guesses, they got to see the answers.  Then they wrote one more response about which one surprised them more and why. This helped students see that we still use vocabulary like this today and poets from the past discuss topics we find just as passionate now. 
• As I circulated the room I heard some great discussions here!
3. Another common thread was students said they didn't understand what made a poem good or bad, so at another station they watched a clip from the Dead Poet's Society. They summarized it, said what the teacher felt about poetry and stated if they agreed or disagreed. 
• This was a close second for their favorite station. Students thought the scene was very funny, and they agreed with the teacher.
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4. To get a little more non-fiction in, they answered questions from a non-fiction text about science and language arts being mutually exclusive. Not only did they practice SAT-like questions,  but they read more about the information emphasized in their textbook. 

There were a few other stations (based on the textbook and rhyme scheme) but these haven't changed in the past few years. The stations mentioned above were specifically added (or altered) based on students' poetic journeys. This was a great way to ease them into poetry and students could tell that I took time to cater to their needs, and that they appreciated.