Ideas in Education: Taboo and Flyswatter
Taboo
One of my favorite vocabulary and identification games was a variation of Taboo. At the end of a class (or weekly or whenever), I gave students a list of words, people, places, things, etc. and an index card for each word. Each group then created a Taboo card for each word. This required them to write the word at the top of the card and then 3-5 taboo words that could not be used for the next part. I identified the number of descriptors necessary.
After creating the cards and studying the words, the groups would then trade cards with another group and have a team vs team competition. Team A would give their cards to Team B and vice-versa. The game begins.
- Using Team A’s cards, Team B would have one member come to the front of the classroom (or the side of the classroom so many teams were playing at the same time). This team member is the giver of clues. The other team members were guessers and were facing the giver.
- The giver tries to get his/her team to guess the word, but the giver cannot use any of the words listed on the card. They are taboo.
- A member of Team A would stand behind Team B’s giver to make sure the rules were being followed. If a giver uses a taboo word, the team loses a point or a penalty time is added.
- Each team would time how long it would take the other team to get through all of the cards OR you can shuffle the cards and compete by allotting x-number of minutes to each team and seeing how many cards they can get through in that time. In this method, teams are paired up so that there are several games going on at the same time. For each passed/unguessed or illegal clue, 30 seconds was added to the team’s time.
Throughout the year, we created a sizeable collection of words to play with as we continually added to the stack.
Alternatives:
- In the card creation stage, give students different lists of words. This is a way of leveling the assignment.
- Create the cards yourself and jump right into the game stage or review stage.
- Use words from previous units, as a means of distributed practice.
- Have one member from each team go to the front of the class. Teammates can only guess when their teammate is giving the clues. Each team is given x-number of seconds to guess the word. They are awarded a point for each word guessed. If the team doesn’t guess the word in the allotted time, the card is passed to the giver of the next team. If the word isn’t guessed by any of the teams, the next up team selects a new card and begins.
Polytheistic
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Harry Truman
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Flyswatter.
Setup: Write words on the board and divide class into teams. To keep the game moving and to ensure all students were participating, I recommend smaller teams and having 2 or 3 teams competing against each other instead of 2 teams for the entire class. If you do this, you’ll need the words written multiple times on the board.
Playing:
- Have each team line up and provide a flyswatter to the first person.
- State an example, definition, or clue for one of the posted words. The students slap the corresponding word with the flyswatter.
- Whoever’s flyswatter lands on the word first scores a point for his/her team.
- They pass the flyswatter to the next person.
Tasks, Important Information, Upcoming Events
Friday will be an A-Day. As always Tuesday and Thursday will be B-Days; Wednesday will be an A-Day.
Students will sign up for their Mustang Morning Sessions on Tuesday after announcements. Directions for signing up are in the Announcements section of our webpage and are also included in Schoology. Friday will be a Mustang Morning period.
Long lunch will begin on Friday. Lunches are based on your 2A class (same as all A-days).
CATEC: Normal arrival and departure.
College Planning Night: September 4 (5:00-7:00pm)
Science Honor Society Blood Drive: September 6
Student Pictures: September 10 and September 11 (pictures will be taken during social studies classes)
Back to School Night: September 11 (6:30-8:30)
During Back to School night families will have an opportunity to meet with their child’s teachers by following their child’s schedule.
Time
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Period
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6:30-6:55
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Mr. Vrhovac’s Presentation in Auditorium
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7:00-7:07
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1A
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7:12-7:19
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2A
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7:24-7:31
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3A
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7:36-7:43
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4A
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7:48-7:55
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1B
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8:00-8:07
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2B
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8:12-8:19
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3B
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8:24-8:30
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4B
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If you have a child who will be taking the PSAT at Monticello or any other school this year, please email Paul Jones. We need to know for test security/administration.
Birthdays
Coming soon!
Useful Information
Morning Announcement Stream: http://streaming.k12albemarle.org/ACPS/links.htm
Want something included on the Monticello Outlook Calendar, the Monticello website, in the PowerSchool Daily Bulletin, schoolwide Schoology accounts, or the student newsletter (viewed by parents, students and staff)? Please use this link https://goo.gl/forms/bIjfJLKokWPcEHx33
Worth Your Time
