games Archives - Rachel What If

The Name Game- A Powerful Cooperative Learning Strategy

Do a google search for “The Name Game” and you might never forgive me for getting that old tune stuck in your head all day: “Judy, Judy bo Budy, banana-fana fo Fudy…” How did that song become such a sensation?

Annoying soundtracks aside, The Name Game I am sharing here is a powerful, easy, and fun cooperative learning strategy that you will set on repeat every chance you get.

Three Good Things

Lots of good things come in threes: The Three Little Pigs, the original Star Wars, the Sanderson Sisters, etc. When facilitating The Name Game, just remember the number three. You will need three balls, or other objects to throw, at least three people, and the three rules below:

Say the person’s name that you are going to throw the ball to before you throw it.
Throw the ball in a way that the person can catch it.
Throw the ball to the same person.

The First Ball-Follow the Rules

These “footbags” or hacky sacks are the best for the first and second rounds

Don’t be fooled by the implied simplicity of The Name Game. Often, when something looks easy, it’s because we have spent countless hours perfecting it to look that way. Think brushing your teeth: years of reminders from your parents, cavities, cleanings, etc.

Be a stickler about following the rules for the first round, and use a ball that is easy to catch and throw, like a beanbag or hacky sack. You will probably even hear a comment or two about how this is too easy, cue the 5th grade boy who is trying to show off by using just one hand.

Rule #1- Say the name

Saying a person’s name shows respect. According to an article in the Washington Post, “A person’s name is the greatest connection to identity and individuality.” When we look at someone and say their name it sends the message that we see them. Such a small thing, but a moment of connection can be the anchor that keeps us steady in a day filled with choppy waters.

Also, saying a person’s name before you throw the ball shows kindness. Again, this is a small act that sends the message, “Don’t worry, I’m not going to throw anything until you are ready.” When you say their name, they will automatically look toward you, signaling they are ready for whatever it is you are going to “give” them.

Rule #2-The trust throw

The second rule to remember is to throw the ball in a way that the person can catch it. This builds trust. “I trust you that you are going to throw it in the right direction, with just the right amount of height and velocity. Not only that, but you trust me, that I will catch it. You believe I can catch it, and we are building a two way relationship-throwing and catching.”

rule #3-same same same

The third rule is to always throw it to the same person. This builds consistency. Consistency creates of feeling of safety in some ways because it sets us up to know what to expect. I know that you are going to throw the ball to me, and I am going to throw the ball to the next person. This becomes the most important part of this game and is a big part of why this is considered a cooperative learning game. We will know we are successful when we can complete at least one full round of ball tosses without dropping the ball. Having met the goal, we can now tackle more complex tasks.

The Second Ball- Create a Sense of Urgency

Just when you think you’ve got it all figured out, i.e., life in 2019, you’ve got another think coming my friend. (Check out this blog post on how we’ve been saying that saying wrong forever.) Adding a second ball to The Name Game adds a level of intrigue and a little thing I like to call urgency.

Knowing that another ball is coming soon, means I have got to get rid of this ball I am holding. Sometimes, when I feel a sense of urgency, I lose my ability to maintain the things I have already built, just little things like respect and trust. I might forget to say your name, I will probably throw the ball a little harder or faster and you will feel set up for failure. But, if we can trust ourselves and each other, we can still be successful and even have fun. Urgency can create a level of challenge that is fun!

Remember the goal is still success still here, so having a second bean bag or hacky sack is best. We are leveling up the challenge just a little at a time. Even leveling up to a tennis ball could be too much for many groups. Always wait until success is achieved, getting the ball all the way through to each person, before adding a level of complexity.

The Third Ball- Ready to Take Risks

People are interesting. When they experience the level of challenge a second ball brings to the group, and they also see the potential for success, they seem a little hungry. They want to live on the edge, or at least take a peek over it. They want to see what it is they are made of. (link to my own blog post)

Don’t get too hasty. We can’t just go jumping off cliffs without first checking to make sure we’ve got a parachute and we know how to use it. Your group has to earn it. I know its just a Name Game folks, but get excited with me.

When you feel they are ready, here are some ways to level up: With young players, adding a small but somewhat heavy stuffed animal will be plenty of excitement and challenge for these guys. Don’t forget high school kids are still kids, and are excited to throw around a little stuffed Bigfoot. You could also add a medium sized ball that bounces, like a basket ball to the mix. Now, participants have to change the way they throw the ball. So its a thinking activity. “I threw that last one, but now I am going to bounce this one.” Brain change.

The Secret Sauce-Debrief

When will be know we are successful? Add an element that seems just out of reach to the group. Say something like, “You will know you are good, really good, when you can add something with a lot of risk.” Anything with liquids adds a lot of risk: a small water bottle, a milk carton, a gallon jug. The stakes get higher when there is a possibility that someone could get covered in milk. Don’t get too carried away. There are risks, and then there are big mistakes. We aren’t going to start throwing knives or anything.

Name what the group has learned, how the experience felt, and what was done to overcome obstacles or correct mistakes. Why was this important? What were the challenges and triumphs? How did you feel and how does this transfer to other tasks in our day and life?

Check out this blog post, four easy ways to bring cooperative learning back to your classroom, for more cooperative learning ideas and to get an overview of the challenge and triumph debrief I use.

Enjoy The Name Game the next time you have a group and some time to build cooperation.

4 easy ways to bring cooperative learning back to your classroom!

Kinder through grade twelve, these cooperative learning strategies are tried and true ways to get your students thinking out loud and listening in.

For many of us, cooperative learning became a best practice we had to let go of during the pandemic. All of a sudden, it wasn’t so easy to tell your students to “turn and talk” to their shoulder partner to process a concept or idea.

Just like SEL and Self Care became hot topics once we realized how badly they were needed, cooperative learning needs to make a comeback in a big way.

Who is wise? He who learns from everyone.
Ben Franklin

We need to hear different perspectives. We need to process things orally. We need to follow the trail of ideas to a bigger and more meaningful destination! Enter cooperative learning.

This year, I have had the unique opportunity to work in hundreds of classrooms from kinder all the way up to the big kids in their senior year. Unfortunately, many of these smart capable young people just sort of forgot how to have a conversation with someone else.

So, what makes a cooperative learning experience the ticket to a meaningful conversation? How do we uncover all the great ideas lurking beneath the surface in our students?

1. Break the Ice

First, start with an ice breaker. We’ve got to warm up to the idea of sharing our thinking, even with people we know and love. One of the very best ways to melt the ice is with a smile or a laugh. Give them something unexpected to think over, something low stakes. One of the best and fastest ways to do this is with a “would you rather” question.

Would you rather?

Would you rather questions that are a bit quirky send the message that it’s ok to think outside the box. It is even better to take a risk and get a little creative. Best of all, be a little bit weird.

When I ask students if they would rather have an elephant-sized duck or one hundred duck-sized elephants, the responses are genuinely original. Fourth graders are devising a business plan to grow and sell duck-sized elephants, while their classmates are discussing how practical it would be to ride an elephant-sized duck over land, air, and sea.

By having your students move to one side of the room or the other based on their choice, you have now included movement, which is another critical piece to the warm-up for cooperative learning and deeper academic conversations.

Another great way to break the ice and prep those brilliant minds for cooperative learning is to start with a brain break.

Time for a brain break

Brain Breaks are quickly becoming the norm in many elementary classrooms throughout the day. Not only because of all the research showing its benefits to giving kids a learning boost but because they just know it works.

“Pink Toe” is one of my favorite brain breaks because it’s quick and silly and appropriate for any fun-loving group. The person leading this brain break calls out a body part and a color. (I dare you to say the words body part in a fifth-grade classroom.)

Participants will then move quickly to touch the color with the body part called out. For example, if you say “Pink Toe,” everyone must move quickly to something pink, and touch it with their toe. I recommend keeping your shoes on, but do what tickles your fancy (or your toes.)

Now that everyone has smiled and warmed up a bit, let us move on to the cooperative part.

2. Which one does not belong.

This activity is awesome because there is no right answer. In a world where we place so much emphasis on being right, we forget how to have real problem-solving and inclusive conversations.

To get things started, display a large image like the one below from an amazing free resource over at wodb.ca.

The image is divided into four sections, each is related in some way but also has characteristics that make it the odd one out. (If you have any siblings, no further explanation is needed.) Ask your students to take a little think time to look at all four images and choose one that does not belong with the others.

Once they have decided on one, they will need to explain their reasoning for why they chose it. For example, in the image above, the star does not belong because it does not have a red outline like the other shapes.

Now that we are sharing our perspectives and reasonings, students start to discover that there is no wrong answer. Hooray! We can all be right at the same time! World peace. Done.

But what about…?

Here is where that one math teacher always politely reminds us that we cannot have world peace in math. Math must have the right answer. Just take a look at these fun little number talks from wodb.ca and let the madness begin.

I threw the bacon and donuts in there just for fun.

Enter cooperative learning. Group your class into 3-4, give them a new image with four related concepts. They can now have a small group discussion about how the images are all related, and start pointing out the ones that do not belong.

Many students will choose different images for different reasons just naturally. This is what we want. We are hoping for a little disagreement. You may even need to encourage a little more disagreement. Respectful disagreement. Oh, how the world would be a more wonderful place if we could practice a little more respectful disagreement.

3. Classified

Scientifically speaking, not CIA speaking, to classify is to put things into groups. Like goes with like, birds go with bees because they both fly. You know. Determining which things should be placed together and why is fertile ground for a cooperative learning experience.

To begin, give groups of students a stack of cards with images or words on them. Apples to Apples Big Picture is a great resource for this.

Next, students will spread out all the cards to look for reasons to begin to classify the cards into groups. Discussions will naturally begin about why certain cards belong together.

Can you see why these cards were classified together?

To dial up the complexity, ask them to create no less than three groups and no more than six. This makes it more difficult for them to take the easy road with a “people” group and an “animal” group.

Finally, students will label each group that they have created with a word that describes the group as a whole. Students will then travel the room at your signal to see what other students have classified and why.

Depending on the grade level, ask them to either rearrange the cards at each table to form new classifications of cards or ask them to create a new label for the classifications that are created. Either way, enlightening and delightful discourse flows!

4. Match Mine

3rd graders comparing their models to the original

And now for the main event. My number one go-to strategy to get even the toughest of skeptics to believe in cooperative learning is Match Mine. I truly believe we could begin to solve the world’s problems with a few legos and a whole lot of active listening.

To get cooperative learning started, group your students. Three to four students in a group is ideal, and review ideas for handling frustration and noise levels.

To begin, create a model of 8-10 blocks and hide it from the students. Give students their own set of blocks, but be sure they don’t have all the right pieces or all the identical pieces.

For activities to be truly cooperative there must be a common goal the students are working toward. In this case, the goal is to work together to build a duplicate model of the one that is hidden.

One member of each team will be given about 10 seconds to view the hidden model before returning to their team to begin giving them directions on how to build it.

But what about…?

Here is the kicker: the student who saw the hidden model MUST keep their hands behind their backs while giving instructions. Game. Changer. Yes, this can get frustrating, be sure to review some strategies for that ahead of time.

Don’t Forget the Debrief

When you give students the opportunity to reflect and name the experiences they just had during a cooperative learning activity, you open the door for them to own it.

Not only that, you validate their experience. You give it value. A great way to debrief any experience is to draw a quick T-chart. One side will be the challenges and the other will be the triumphs.

Challenges

Having done this hundreds of times, every group names all the same things. The first challenge they always name is that they don’t have the right materials. Time, no hands, and remembering the model are always on the list as well.

Triumphs

The word triumph is fully intentional. Now you get to celebrate the good stuff. The stuff that happened because of the challenges. Fun makes the top of the list, followed by working together, time (again) and finally the opportunity to be creative.

If the teams had exactly the same blocks, they would have missed the chance to get creative.

Isn’t this what we want more of? They do.

I hope you will give these a try and if you do, let me know in the comments how it went!

4 Big Reasons to Love Breakout EDU

Three years ago, I used the majority of my teaching budget (very small) to buy a Breakout Edu Kit. It was, and still is, one of the best teaching tools I have ever invested in.

If you still haven’t heard of this awesome teaching tool, the concept is a little bit like the popular escape rooms popping up all over the world.

Escape room victory photo! L-R my older sister, younger sister, mom, and me

My first Escape Room experience was ~~mind-blowing~~, ~~like going to Disneyland~~, super crazy fun.

After paying for our tickets, our little group was invited into a small room together, where we were asked to give up our cell phones. We listened for a few minutes as the game master explained the rules of the game, and also how he would be available for support if needed. We then followed him into another small room where we were left with one hour to figure things out and get our picture taken to admit defeat or claim ourselves geniuses.

Ok, now can you just read that paragraph again with your teaching lenses on?

I am resisting the urge to italicize the entire paragraph for emphasis. Is this not everything we want in education, maybe minus the small rooms?

My escape room experience left me with no choice but to find a way to recreate as much of it as possible in my classroom. Thankfully, I discovered BreakoutEDU!

So… here are my three BIGGEST reasons for loving Breakout EDU.

Stickers to decorate my box are on the way!

1. Reason #1- Competent and Connected

The way to motivate people to work hard is to give them challenging tasks that they can figure out for themselves while making them feel competent and connected.
USA Today

Struggle doesn’t feel good. That’s why it works. Sometimes we just want people to give us the answers. Actually, I wish someone would please tell me what to do everyday to be blissfully happy, content, successful, and to finally have the carefully sculpted arms of an athlete.

We do have to work for things, especially the things I mentioned above. Work can be a struggle, but it can also be fun. There is nothing more powerful than knowing you can do something. Independence is not about never asking for help, its about being a good learner.

How much could you accomplish if you felt competent and connected? Feeling competent means you are willing to recognize that you do have skills and apply them to the current situation. It may take a loving nudge or an encouraging word, but you can do it! You got this.

Feeling connected means you can also appreciate and recognize that other people have skills and perspectives that can also be applied to the current situation. Collaboration is not just a nice thing to try, it is absolutely essential, especially when solving problems.

Reason #2- Curiosity and Urgency

The concept for Breakout Edu’s kit is a bit different from an escape room in that you aren’t actually trying to break out of a room. Instead, you are working to break into a box.

Why would you want to break into a locked box? What could be so great about whatever is in that box that you need to spend all this time trying to get locks open to get into it? Aha! Your wondering right now aren’t you?

Curiosity. This is what led Alice down the rabbit hole. This is what killed the cat. This is what… ok, ok. You get the point.

This quote is one of my all-time favorites. I might have a thing for Godmothers lately, which you can read about in my previous post, How to Teach Like Cinderella.

Speaking of Cinderella, another important element that is a big part of the breakout experience is the sense of urgency.

Urgency makes things important. Cinderella had to get away from the castle before the clock struck twelve, or…her horses would turn into mice, and all that.

I currently have a Breakout Edu game going at a friend’s house. It’s been over a month now and they still haven’t solved the puzzles. This is not for lack of curiosity. The last game I set up for them had them working on it relentlessly and solved within a couple of hours.

This time, there isn’t a sense of urgency. There really wasn’t before, but it was new and novelty trumps most things. I guess I need to go get my box.

Reason #3- Backward Design and Failure

Every Breakout Edu game starts with backward design. Backward design is the first element of effective instruction and a best practice for planning. It provides the structure, and when you have structure you allow for creativity.

Solving all the puzzles leads to opening all the locks, which leads to getting the box open. When you plan your first breakout, you will start with the final box. You’ve got to think through the game from end to beginning. Now, don’t let your control freak come out here. You are simply setting up a pathway, the absolute magic happens when your players collaborate, problem-solve, create strategies, and fail. They fail and they fail and they fail until they get it right.

The funny thing is failing doesn’t feel so bad when you don’t have time for it. Sulking is a complete and utter waste of time and everyone understands that pretty quickly in a timed breakout.

However, your first breakout should be set up in a way that is building the stamina of your players. Even better if you have players that have done something similar in the past. Do you not love that we are calling our students players now?

Backward Design gives us the gift of a destination, while allowing us to creatively chart our own course.

#4 When Time Runs Out

Time. The thing we all want more of, and the thing we fear the most. You know that feeling when you have a room full of energetic kids and nothing planned to fill that time? Yikes.

When the time runs out on your Breakout Edu game, it runs out. Your players may not have gotten into that box, and this is actually a good thing. Kids, and adults, are so used to getting what they want, when they want it. That feeling you get when you realize its not happening is a healthy thing.

Its called following through with what you said, and also reality. We are not always going to solve everything. What we can do is play a new game and apply what we learned from the last one. This is one of the best parts of the game. Do not let your game end without a discussion about what went well, and what wasn’t working. This is called learning.

I can’t wait to hear about your experiences using a breakout style lesson in your classroom, or with your friends at your local escape room! What if we changed the way education is done by calling ourselves players instead of students.