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Dolch Sight Words > Activities > Bingo
Sight Words Bingo
One fun activity, which can really capture students' attention, but also helps teach reading, is to play bingo in class. Of course, we're not talking about ordinary bingo!
What teacher does, is ahead of time, create a bingo card (also known as a "bingo board" or "bingo worksheet") for each student in the class - this does not have to be difficult or time consuming, as bingo card maker software can do all the hard work of preparing the bingo cards. The bingo cards contain sight words (or anything else that you might like) in their squares.
Suitability:
These types of classroom bingo activities are suitable for:
- Kindergarten
- K-12 Education
- English as a Second Language classes ("ESL").
How to Play:
Here is how to play sight words bingo:
- Before class, the teacher uses
some bingo card maker
software to pepare a set of bingo cards (also known as
"bingo boards" or "bingo worksheets") containing the
particular words chosen for that class - one bingo card per student.
- In class, you simply play bingo with the teacher playing the part
of bingo caller, and calling out the words in random order.
- Student mark off words from their card as they are called out, by
crossing the squares (or putting a counter over the squares) on their
cards.
- The first student to achieve a winning pattern (the teacher needs to decide in advance what this is, for example a line of five crossed out items, or two intersecting lines of five crossed out items, etc.) and call out "Bingo!" is a winner.
Variations:
There are many possible variations of the game that you can use for teaching reading, vocabulary, English, and other subjects such as math and foreign languages. For example:
- Phonemic Awareness Bingo - The bingo cards are printed with letters.
The teacher, reads out a word, and students have to recognize the initial
Letter and look for it on their bingo card.
- Rhyming Bingo - The teacher reads out words and students must
find a word that rhymes with it on their bingo cards.
- Vocabulary Bingo - The teacher gives the definition of a word,
and students must find the matching word on their bingo cards.
- Parts of Speech Bingo - The teacher gives a clue for a part of
speech (for example, "a verb beginning with V"), and students
must find the matching word on their bingo cards.
- Foreign Language Bingo - The bingo cards are printed with
words from a foreign language such as
French,
German,
Italian or
Spanish,
the teacher makes bingo calls in English, and students must find the matching
foreign language word on their bingo cards. The teacher can also reverse this, and
use English-language bingo cards and make the bingo calls in
French,
German,
Italian or
Spanish.
- Math Bingo - The bingo cards are printed with numbers which are
the answers to math problems. The teacher calls out a math problem (it could
be addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, or perhaps a problem
involving decimals or rounding, etc.) and the students must solve the problem
and find the matching square on their card.
- Ice-Breaker Bingo - This is a good way to introduce students in a new class to each other and to teacher. The bingo cards are printed with the student's names. The teacher calls out the student's names in random order, and the corresponding student must stand up, introduce themselves and tell the class a little about themselves. You continue playing bingo in the normal way, but when a student calls out "Bingo!", he must not only have a winning pattern on his card, but he must be able to point out each of the student's whose name forms part of the pattern (if he is unable to do so, continue playing until one of the students can do this).
- Educational Bingo
Print bingo cards containing sight words (or anything else you like) from your computer - Ideal for Teachers!
Classroom Bingo! A great way to teach reading! |
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