Words with Friends: It's All Greek to Me

Words with Friends & Greek Roots:

   For teacher appreciation week, Teachers Pay Teachers was having a sale and I picked up this cute set of Greek root word cards. As a former elementary school teacher, I have to admit, I am still attracted to cute. I bought them mostly because they were cute. Here is a link to the 2 Brainy Apples TpT store where I bought the Greek word wall cards.

   Okay, it's cute but now what do I do with this? I was cutting and thinking while my class was busy making up games for an unrelated lesson in History when it occurred to me: I need to make a game too. I used to like playing Words with Friends and I know a lot of my students are familiar with the game as well. If you are unfamiliar with Words with Friends, this site explains the rules. It is similar to scrabble.

So why not combine this root word wall with a game everyone enjoys? 

Root Word Wall Goes Interactive

   I used a sticker chart poster for the game board. I cut the student name side and enough of the grid off to make it square. Then I looked up an image of Words with Friends online so I could color in the double and triple word/letter squares accurately. We don't have a laminating machine at school any more, so I used clear packing tape to cover the playing board. I hope that the packing tape works to make it so that we can write on the board with vis-a-vis pens and wipe it off and start over. We shall see.

   My plan for adapting this game is to display three root words for the game. Students can add words to the game board whenever they get an idea-the bulletin board is right by the pencil sharpener, so it's not out of the norm for people to get up and go over there. My two classes will each use a different color of vis-a-vis pen, so I know who's words are who's. The catch is, only words containing one of the three Greek root words can be added to the board. 

   Over the weekend, I post a photo of the three Greek root words for the week on my class Instagram, so the kids can start thinking of words ahead of time.

   I added a piece of chart paper to keep track of the highest scoring words from each class, and inspire a little friendly competition.