Debbie's Spanish Learning: KLOO {Great Language Learning Game}

Thursday, February 18, 2016

KLOO {Great Language Learning Game}

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Games are so vital to my language teaching. Through them, students can learn vocabulary and grammar in a less tedious way. A few weeks ago, one of my parents mentioned the game KLOO to me. I immediately went and ordered it and fell in love with it!

The game requires that you can read in English and then have a basic knowledge of the sound system of the language you are learning. I would say that it is appropriate for late elementary kids all the way to adults. The players DO NOT need to know all the vocabulary to play. Actually, the point of the game is to play and learn the vocabulary as you go.

The game involves sentence building, but your students don't need to know necessarily how to build a sentence in the language as the arrows on the cards indicate what type of word comes next. Points are earned by creating longer sentences and translating the words. After my students create a sentence, I do make them say the sentence in the target language before translating it. That way I can check their pronunciation. Because the cards are color-coded you can actually use them to talk about the parts of speech (noun, verb, adjective).

The game comes in Spanish, French, or Italian, and the vocabulary is based on vocabulary from Spain, France, and Italy. I have never been to Spain; I speak Argentine Spanish, but that in no way lessened the value of the game. There were a few words I didn't know. I would say it is just another opportunity to talk to your students about dialectical and vocabulary differences between countries.

Here is the KLOO game site with videos that explain how the game is played. {I believe there are several ways to play.} The original version, "Classic KLOO" is super-easy to learn in a few minutes. Here is a look at all the versions that are available:

Spanish