Are you ready to explore the wonderful world of gamification and see how it can level up your classroom experience and engage eager young minds? 🧠 🎮
First things first: what exactly is gamification? 🤔 Simply put, it’s applying game design elements to non-game contexts, like your classroom. This can be as basic as implementing competition or manipulatives into a standard classroom activity or as complex as playing digital games to develop an in-depth understanding of core content.
The benefits of gamification in the classroom are enormous! 🤯 One major perk is increased student engagement. Picture this: instead of glazed-over eyes during a traditional lesson, you have a room full of excited kiddos eager to tackle the next challenge. That’s the magic of gamification at work! Students are more motivated to participate and absorb information when learning feels like play. Gamification also fosters a sense of friendly competition and collaboration among students. Whether racing against the clock to solve a Maths puzzle or working together to conquer an English challenge, they’re building important teamwork skills while having a blast.
Now, let’s talk tactics. How can you gamify your lessons to keep those young learners on their toes? In this blog, we’ll explore the best ways to incorporate gamification into your English and Maths lessons using some of our favourite TT resources, including our massive digi-game library featuring over 1000 pre-made interactive games perfect for capturing your students’ attention and reviewing important curriculum content. 💛
💛 Digi-Game Zone (pictured): We have so many digi-games for English in our Digi-Game Zone for every year level that you’re going to absolutely love! 🥰 Early years will enjoy our collection of “Does It Start With…” games, asking students to identify initial sounds from images. Middle primary students will love our collections covering prefixes, suffixes, homophones and so much more. And for our upper years subscribers, challenge your classes with games on Greek & Latin roots, similes or irregular plurals!
There truly is something for everyone.
Plus, each game follows one of ten simple and exciting formats, allowing students to pick and choose their favourite games while not over-complicating your lessons by spending valuable learning time trying to figure out how to play 😅
Let us know @topteacher what your favourite digi-game is! Mine is definitely Let’s Farm 👀
💛 Interactive PowerPoints: We have a wide range of no-prep interactive PowerPoints perfect for whole class instruction or individual play on tablet devices. They can be used as a warm-up before a lesson or a wind-down conclusion, and are ideal for relief teacher plans or busy classroom days. Some of our favourites include:
⭐️ Pizza Parlour CVCC & CCVC Words POWERPOINT
⭐️ The Very Hungry Mr. Froggy Prefixes POWERPOINT
⭐️ Inference Detectives POWERPOINT
⭐️ Author’s Purpose PIE’ED Face Interactive POWERPOINT
💛 Digi-Game Zone: We have digi-games for every Maths concept you can imagine! From times table reviews and order of operations to number bonds of 10 and percentage discounts, we have you covered no matter what year level you’re working with!
💛 Gamifying the Digi-Tool Dashboard: Our digi-tool dashboard isn’t just for utility! Many of its functions can be used in-class to gamify standard Maths learning experiences. Use the timer to turn mental maths into an electrifying race, create riddles to find unknown numbers on the place value mat, roll the dice to create chance experiments or use spinners to randomise questions and answers. Simple additions like these take minimal planning and add a fun element of surprise to any learning experience ⭐️
💛 It’s Time to Clash!: While we have so many different interactive PowerPoint options for Maths, the Clash games are one of our personal TT favourites! Available in a range of topics with even more to be added in future drops, our Clash games are super simple and perfect for engaging your whole class in a lesson introduction or conclusion.
💛 Escape the Room: Escape rooms are a classic, engaging puzzle that your students will absolutely love, but they can often take a lot of prep to make and distribute puzzles in a space. Try one of our digital escape rooms such as the Percentages of a Whole POWERPOINT for a thrilling puzzle experience with absolutely no prep required!
You can also use activities such as the Number Sense Write the Room as a digital-free escape room-style activity where students need a completed recording sheet as a ‘key’ to unlock the door!
Limited access to technology? No worries! There are plenty of ways you can gamify your classroom without the use of tech. Check out our favourites ideas below! 👇
💛 Defeat Boredom with Board Games!: Want something a little more hands-on? Engage your students with a board game or card game! Many of our games even come with optional recording sheets, so you can use them as sneaky assessments to get your kids having fun while also checking for understanding ✏️ Use an activity based on an existing game to help limit the amount of time spent learning new rules; some of our favourites include Phuno and Figurative Language Bingo. Or try something new with games like Marvellous Modal Verbs and CCVC Four in a Row!
Maths classes are also a breeze when you incorporate board games. For upper years, you’ll love Reverse It, Cartesian Plane Battleships and the Build a Zoo Area Game; lower years will love the Bowling Pins Game or Crocodile Tens & Ones Snap!
💛 Let’s Get Physical!: Turning your lesson into a game involving physical movement can help immerse even your most distracted students by allowing them to express their energy while engaging in learning. Scavenger hunts are a great way of approaching this, as they can be used in both indoor and outdoor settings.
We have scavenger hunts targeted at specific story books, such as our Bowerbird Blues Scavenger Hunt (hint: this is the National Simultaneous Storytime text for 2024!), as well as hunts for different learning topics and curriculum codes.
Early years will love our Imaginative or Informative? Scavenger Hunt, a low-prep activity perfect for use in the school library, or the super simple 2D Shapes Scavenger Hunt.
Older students will enjoy the Digital & Print Layout Features Scavenger Hunt or the Scavenger Hunt Angles.
You could also easily create your own scavenger hunt using task cards from sorting activities, asking students to find each card and then sort them on a recording sheet. Try this tactic using our digraphs sorting activity, or challenge upper primary classes with the Sorting Bias Cards!
💛 Tackling Task Cards: Our task card packages are the ideal way to get your F-3 students drawing, moulding, clipping and spinning their way to understanding new concepts! We have packages covering a wide range of topics for both English and Maths. Some of our favourites include the Addition & Subtraction within 20 pack, the CVCC & CCVC Words pack and the Prefixes & Suffixes pack! As a bonus, these packs also fit perfectly in the rainbow storage containers sold at stores like Kmart and Spotlight, making it easy to print, package and re-use these sets for years to come ⭐️
Before you immerse yourself in gamification, it’s important to be mindful of potential pitfalls 🙅♀️
One common concern is ensuring that the game elements don’t overshadow the learning objectives. While it’s tempting to focus solely on the fun factor, remember that the ultimate goal is still educational growth. We’ve worked hard to keep this in mind while creating our gamified resources, so you can rest easy knowing all our downloads are designed to keep students engaged while also covering essential curriculum content!
Another thing to keep in mind is accessibility. Not all students may be comfortable playing certain types of games due to different limitations. Be sure to offer a variety of gamification methods to accommodate different learning styles and abilities. Tools such as our digi-tool dashboard can help students who have physical challenges with fine motor tasks such as rolling dice or using spinners. Board games, card games and recording sheets can be enlarged to A3 size to make it easier to read, write and manipulate content. You can also try using digital games on tablets, desktop PCs, laptops or interactive whiteboards depending on which equipment makes the activity easier for the student to complete. We’ve designed all our resources with flexibility in mind so you can use them to cater to all your students’ needs 💛
So there you have it! Gamification is like sprinkling a little extra magic into your classroom routine. With its proven benefits and endless possibilities, you’ll be well on your way to creating an engaging and memorable learning experience for your students in no time. Game on! 🎮📚
