Review Games

I have always loved doing review games in class. I can use them with any subject. One class favorite is Jeopardy. I just use the class content to create different categories and I make different questions for each category. Each question is assigned a point value (I ususally assign values starting at 100 and go through 500). At the end of the game, student teams can wager their available points for a chance to add more points or even double their scores on a final Jeopardy question. It's a lot of fun and my class begs to play. A few years ago I purchased a set of these buzzers. My students love using them. Each buzzer makes a different sound. You just have to be careful with them because if the students get too excited and slam them very hard, they will get stuck.

 Most students are in my class for two years since I teach 3rd and 4th combined. But I've been using this game for many years more than that and so I started to look for some more quick and easy review games that were just as fun. We still do Jeopardy, but just mix things up a bit more with other games as well.

Pinterest can be a teacher's best friend. There's so much inspiration there and I could literally get lost for hours. I have found some other great games that are super easy and I have tested them out. The students are pretty excited about using them as well. The latest one that I tested out was called Grudgeball. Here's a link to the website (over at toengagethemall.com). Each team starts the game with 10 x's on the board. When a question is answered correctly, the team can choose to earse 2 x's from another team's score or they can split the x's and erase on from two differnt teams. There's also an option for students to be able to erase more points by shooting a basket from different lines designated in your classroom. I have a little suction cup baskeball set that is perfect for this. The students in my class gave it a big two thumbs up!

Another game, Stinky Feet, is a great game that we will definitely try again. You draw a big foot and make squiggly marks around it to make it look stinky. Then you use sticky notes to write point values on (Be sure to write them underneath so that when you stick the note around on your foot drawing they will look like blank notes.). Some of the points will be positive points such as +5, or + 10...however high you want to go. I think I added one high of +50. Then some of the notes are programed with negative scores such as -10 and - 5.  After trying this game out, I would suggest making less of the negative score notes. Each time a team answers a quiz quesiton correctly, the team chooses a note and that score is added or taken away from their total. The team with the most points wins the game. Again, this is SO. MUCH. FUN. And I think what makes it even more fun is the element of surprise. You just never know what you will get.

The final new game I've tried out this school year is calleld Zap. Here's a link. You need library card pockets. Or you can make your own, like I did. Here's a link to a printable card.   You will need 16 cards. I glued four rows of four on the pockets on a big chart paper. Next, I printed the cards from the website to go inside.  There are fun cards like, "Switch scores with another team." and "Zap another team" (which leaves them without any points at all) and many other fun cards. When a team gets a question right, they pick a pocket and I read their card and then we adjust the scores.

I use review games a lot to quiz my class over social studies, science, and Bible.
What fun review games do you play in your class?