Adding Fun to Vocabulary Learning

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When you teach a language you are always looking for ways to add some fun to learning the endless amount of words that a student needs in order to communicate. A few weeks ago I bought a Magnetic Write-on Wipe-off Die and have been using it in my summer classes. The die is not quite five inches across and has dry erase surfaces that are also magnetic. Since I have been doing a bug unit this summer I decided to take the cards from a game I have, Bug Out , and use those along with the die to practice our vocabulary.

I wrote a Spanish word on each side of the die...they were all the names of insects that were represented on some of the cards.  Obviously as you can see from the picture there were more types of insects than I was able to put on the die. That is ok. It just means that students have to sort through to find what they are looking for. On one side I did put the word "insecto" so that they could pick up anyone that was a true insect. To play the game, I laid out all the cards.  The first student rolled the die and read the word.  He then tried to find the insect that corresponded with the word in Spanish.  Then we went to the next player. If a student rolled a word that no longer had a card then we just moved on to the next player. I timed the game to only last five minutes.  At the end of the game, the students counted {in Spanish, of course!} their cards to see who had the most.

This simple game can be used with any set of vocabulary as long as you have picture cards for the words you are working on. The write-on die has the potential for a plethora of uses! I am going to be on the lookout for other ways to incorporate it into my lessons.




A little more information on the die...I have read reviews that the magnetic part {supposedly you can attach magnetic pictures to the white spaces} doesn't work that great. I don't really plan to use the dice that way, but thought I would mention it. Also, as you play with the die, you have the potential to wipe off the words if you touch the white parts.  I have taught my students to handle the die on the colored areas.  It seems to work well.

Here are some links for different picture cards to use with this type of game {click on the image}...

{The caterpillar game would be a great way to review the vocabulary from that book.}