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Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Typhoon!


I learned this game during CTF, and it was one of the most popular things ever. Perhaps second only to Bingo.

How to play:

1. Create questions. I typically use this game for review, just like Bingo. Typhoon has a little more versatility than Bingo, however.
2. Create the playing board. I pre-set the scores in the grid (see photo) prior to the lesson. Each row and each column only has one "typhoon" - the T. On a 5x5 grid, I have one 6, two 5's, three 4's, four 3's , five 2's, and the remaining are 1's.
3. Split class into two (or more) teams. Rock-paper-scissors to see which team goes first.
4. Teams answer questions. They may work together, or not. Usually I let them discuss, but there is only one spokesperson. If the first team doesn't know, then the second team has an opportunity to answer, and thus stealing more points.
5. Team spokesperson chooses the squares battleship-style (i.e. "A4," "C1"). Their team gets that many points set on the grid.
6. If a "T" is chosen, everybody's points gets whipped from the score board. Leave the revealed squares up.

Obviously, the more teams, the bigger the grid needs to be. 5x5 is sufficient for two teams to play for a good 20-30 minutes, depending on how hard the questions are to the students. I would up it to at least 6x6 for three teams, 7x7 for four teams, and so on. Likewise, six T's belong in a 6x6 grid, and so on.

It's pretty fun, and it can get rowdy. I've set rules such as "minus a point or lose a turn if any team member speaks out of turn." It's effective sometimes, and then not so much other times. It's probably because of the the underlying discipline system in place before the game. My discipline system is still rather weak. Eh. It'll be something I'll constantly work on for the rest of my teaching career.

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