Another Quick, Low-Prep Way To Practice Vocabulary!

I like to play games in class, and I LOVE teaching content area vocabulary, so here's another quick, easy, low (or no!) prep way to review vocabulary terms with any slush time you may find yourself with!

SET UP

• Have a word wall.  I use my vocabulary word wall tiles (click the link to check them out!) for all the topics I cover.  Throughout the year, I post them and leave them up so that by the end of the school year we have around eighty or so - we're currently up to 58 words.  It doesn't have to be my tiles though - any words will do.

STEPS

• Assign a student to keep track of the number of words used.
• Select a "starter word".  It doesn't matter which work you pick, but it should be one that everyone knows.
• Ask for a volunteer to pick another work on the wall that is connected to the starter word, and explain their connection (EX: I pick ziggurat to start, and a student might say, "Colosseum is connected to ziggurat because they are both large buildings.")
• If it's a logical connection, say, "Great!  Who can connect a word to that one?
• Repeat the process until your allotted time is up.
• At the end, see how many words you used.  The next time you do this, the goal is to make more connections.

TAKEAWAYS

• Students make great connections.
• Competitions = high levels of participation.
• You get to see what connections your students are making.
• This gives you another Marzano aligned tool for your teaching tool box!