Instructions
Objective: To encourage students to learn important subject material and develop citizenship skills while having fun. Brain Savvy - Classroom EditionTM promotes cooperation, stimulates students to learn the lesson materials while providing positive reinforcement in a team environment. Brain Savvy - Classroom EditionTM works with any subject matter. Teachers and/or students create the questions for each session. The winner’s ribbons on the gameboard are colored in, using the included erasable markers, to indicate which team is in the lead. The game can be played on a long-term basis, usually for a lesson segment, or you could continue around the track until the end of a pre-designated time, such as a day, weeks, quarter, semester or even year. The team in the lead, at that end of the predetermined time, is declared the “Champions”. They should be acknowledged as such; more on this later.EASY SETUPTEAM ASSIGNMENTTo begin, every student in the classroom is randomly assigned to a team where the student will remain the entire school year. Every student is asked to draw a numbered, color chip from a hat (teacher needs to supply the “Hat”). Teams are designated by color and each team member by a number. Teams are color coded for easy organization and small random groups lend themselves to many other creative activities.The teacher immediately records each student’s color and number so students do not “trade’ chips to be with friends. This insures the correct team member answers the question when playing the game.It is imperative that everyone in the class draw a sorting chip to be assigned a team color and number. Initially students are grouped into their teams by colors and in numerical order. The first meeting allows students to see who is on which team and you may wish to have teams select a team mascot or logo to represent their color. Note: It is not necessary for team members to sit together when playing the game; however, it’s probably easier for some activities. Team members could be allowed to meet as a group, during a free time or at teacher’s discretion. They may even request time to meet and study together in preparation for playing Brain Savvy.Rationale for keeping the same team for a year: Research shows that staying with the same team for the entire year creates a long-term learning situation otherwise not possible. This encourages students to learn tolerance and to cooperate with others that they might otherwise never get to know. This is an excellent opportunity to teach a “citizenship” skill. (Really, where does a teacher get the opportunity to teach something like citizenship?) PRE-GAME SET UPColored, numbered chips are included in game, for ease of randomly assigning students to groups. The teacher sets up the random drawing to accommodate class size. For example, 24 students can divide into four teams of six by putting four colors of chips numbering 1-6 in the hat or to use all the colors, six teams of four; for 25 students, five teams of five or six teams of four plus one A classroom of up to 36 students can play. Example: SUSAN is on the green team - #3Team sizes may vary, but everyone has the same chance of being asked a question, making it fair and equitable. Students can learn about these concepts as well. Brain Savvy - Classroom EditionTM stimulates many opportunities for discussion. Discussions are encouraged and can be led by the teachers. Again, teachers have a lot of flexibility and are encouraged to be creative in this aspect of the game. PRE-GAME WARM UP ACTIVITYThe teams have drawn their chips and are grouped into colors. Each color can choose it’s team logo. Note: If students have a problem deciding on a positive logo, they might want to brainstorm team names together as a class. Or the teacher could pre-assign names to the colors: The Red Pirates, The Yellow Sunsets, The Green Dragons, The Blue SkyHawks or The Purple Wizards. Just anything fun (It’s good to have a few fun ideas ready if needed). This is a fun teacher lead activity - brainstorming mascots that represent each color. Or teams can choose among themselves. Encourage them to list several choices. Then the mascot can be equitably voted on among team members. The idea is to keep the same team all semester, so the mascot could be a significant factor if the teachers chooses it to be.Note: You may want to post rules or guidelines, such as “no negative attention is allowed” (if someone gets an answer wrong, it’s the teachers job not to make a big deal about it. Simply draw another chip or roll the dice again,.. to see which person gets to try to answer the question next. By moving on quickly and not paying any undue attention to a wrong answer, any initial stress from the activity will be diminished. We encourage using the same line with every student…”study harder” and move on promptly. PRE-GAME QUESTIONSIMPORTANT: Brain Savvy - Classroom Edition is explicitly a teaching aid. It remains the teacher’s job to provide the questions over the materials being taught or reviewed. Suggestion:Questions may be written by students, or questions may be those the teacher might use to review for a test, such as multiple choice, true/false, fill in the blank, etc. Questions may come from the end of the chapter, from the reading, or from the lesson you just presented. The sky’s the limit.Any subject matter will work. For example, a question may involve coming up to the chalkboard and computing a math problem. In teams competing or individually. The game leaves plenty of room for individual teacher creativity.PRE-GAME PARAMETERSThere must be a designated ending point each time played. It is important for fairness and friendly competition to prepare a stopping point. For example, select the number of questions that will be asked (with discussion) or just set a timer and play for 30 minutes or until the bell rings. You may play as often as you wish, on the subject of your choice. As long as teams are the same, you can use the same game. Note: Separate Brain Savvy, Classroom Edition games may be purchased for coinciding classes, allowing those students to display and mark their teams’ progress on the gameboard. IMPORTANT: Playing Brain Savvy - Classroom EditionTM on a regular basis, builds team camaraderie and team allegiance for positive results. Students crave to fit in and be accepted by peers, whether ‘fitting in’ involves being part of a team effort to learn or negative things like bullying or drug abuse. PLAYING BRAIN SAVVY The teacher attaches the magnetic gameboard onto a white metal markerboard (most teachers have this now instead of green chalkboards). If a classroom does not have this, a small portable white markerboard may be purchased along with the game.Each team is represented by a colored magnet pawn (6 colors included in game).
After teaching a subject/unit, the teacher can use BSCE to ask questions pertaining to the lesson or topic. BSCE provides a gameboard framework to make subject fun to learn. Research shows that more learning occurs when students are actively engaged and having fun.
To play, roll both dice to decide who answers each question. One die determines the team color and the other die determines the team member.
For example it might be blue, #5. So the person who is designated as #5 on the blue team has an opportunity to answer the question.
When that student answers the question correctly, the teacher or team member moves their team’s colored pawn forward one space on the gameboard. The correct answer is not to be made “a big deal” over. Simply moving that team’s marker is positive affirmation enough. If that student does not answer the question correctly within a few seconds the teacher responds with “Study harder”. The teacher re-rolls the dice, giving another student the chance to answer the same question and advance their team’s pawn forward one space. IMPORTANT: The response “study harder” should be used for every missed question. No blame or negative attention is placed on any student/player. If players feel they are being embarrassed, it destroys the team effect. This can be avoided by simply saying the same thing to each person who does not give or gives an incorrect answer (remember not to ad lib here). Note: Do not have students move back for wrong answers; this is a positive reinforcement game, not a negative. Negative consequences can cause team members to get upset with each other and not function as a cohesive and cooperative team. Positive reinforcement is far more productive than negative, especially when learning….even in high school. Proceed through the pre-allotted questions until finished playing for the day or designated time period. Have a winning team member go to the game board and color in the winner’s ribbons on the gameboard with their team color. This shows, at a glance, which team is in the lead.Record in a journal each team’s location compared with the other teams at the end of each session of play. This assures teams can begin the next time with their markers in the proper position. Cheating is often seen as a creative way to win. Rather than being critical, simply keep a written record. This will also prevent those who feel they need to “push the envelope” by being a jokester, or for whatever reason they move the markers. The gameboard provides ribbons to be colored in by the team. The winning team may also be acknowledged by having their winning color and logo displayed in notable ways around the classroom, creating a sense of pride and accomplishment.RESEARCH NOTES FIELD TESTING Students, who played the game for one semester, evaluated the experience. They unanimously agreed that they liked it and that it motivated them to study their assignments. They felt they learned more because of the friendly competition. Students also felt they learned more about others in the classroom from being assigned to random groups. They acknowledged that they probably would never have gotten to know some of the students otherwise. Some even turned out to be good friends.• Playing BRAIN SAVVY did seem to cause some initial stress to underachievers who did not want to speak up or answer questions aloud because of insecurities or shyness. Due to this complicated issue, it was decided that a teacher would never show any displeasure with a student who: a) did not wish to answer because s/he was too shy, b) just did not know the answer, or c) guessed incorrectly. • Even shy students said (when questioned at the end of the year) that they felt this was acceptable and often those shy students were encouraged by their team members, to either speak up more, or study more. In fact, many tutoring sessions were initiated by the students who had a desire to help other team members study in order to benefit the team.• BRAIN SAVVY has been tested with students from preschool through graduate school, and it works! Kids like it and it makes learning fun. Teachers can make cards with questions for review. If you teach the course again, next time you’ll have the cards. Of course you will always be changing out your cards, to keep them fresh.ADDITIONAL SUGGESTIONS Mark the gameboard with erasable color markers to show where existing team’s colored pawns are positioned. This way you can put the team markers back where they were when the alternative game is over. Then play this game, using the same gameboard. ALTERNATIVE :Have teams sit in a circle. Go around the circle. Each person has 5 seconds to give an answer or “pass”. The teacher moves the team one space for each answer given during the time.
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