Here are some of our favorite ideas to create a game show type of environment, get students out of their seats, or just make learning fun and enjoyable again!

Craft Review Games

Jeopardy 

Bring the classic game show into your classroom with Test Prep Jeopardy! You may think this game requires lots of pre-class prep work but it can be as simple or intricate as you like. Yes, you’ll need to set up some type of game board using a whiteboard, blackboard, smartboard, GoogleSlides, or Pear Deck but beyond that, it’s up to you. Simply choose categories based on the topics you want to review and have a list of questions and answers for each level of points.

When it’s time to play, divide the class into four teams. Each team member takes a turn to select a category and amount, for example, “Poetry for $400”. If the student answers the question correctly, the team earns points. At the end of the game, tally up the points to determine the winner!

Knockout! 

Bring a Carnival element to your classroom with this fun game board. Getting the game board setup requires some prep and crafting, but you can re-use it for years! Use hot glue to stick plastic cups in a grid format on a piece of foam board. Be sure to leave some space between the rims! While the glue is drying, prepare slips of paper with review questions and small prizes. Once the glue is dry, place one slip of paper and a prize into each cup and cover it with a piece of tissue paper. Secure the tissue paper with rubber bands.

To play, ask students to come up one at a time and select a cup. Have them punch through the tissue paper to retrieve the question and prize. To keep the prize, they will have to answer the question correctly. Otherwise, the first student to raise their hand and give the correct answer claims the prize for themselves! (limit 2 per student).

Credit Composition Classroom

Tap into Apps and Digital Platforms

Quizizz 

Access a customizable content library to quickly create interactive assessments and engaging quizzes to test students’ knowledge. Motivate students while easing the stress of testing with this enjoyable gamified platform that also gives you real-time data about student performance so you can offer support when needed.

Kahoot!

Choose from 100+ million ready-to-play games or create your own on this game-based classroom response system. Kahoot! allows all students to review contents and tests their understanding simultaneously. Project the multiple-choice questions on the screen and have students answer them on their individual devices. With games for every grade in every subject, getting through test prep with your students will be a breeze.

Flip (Formerly Flipgrid)

If your students love sharing videos with each other, they will love Flip! A free app by Microsoft for video discussion and sharing, you can use Flip to get students to review different topics ahead of testing season. By giving them the chance to showcase their creativity, you keep things fun while ensuring students understand the material being reviewed.

Get Students Out of Their Chairs

Pass the Chicken 

Bring a rubber chicken into your classroom for this test-prep game! Arrange your students so they are seated in a circle. Randomly select a student and give them the rubber chicken to pass around the circle. Ask this student a test review question and they will have as long as it takes for the chicken to make its way around the whole circle to answer. If they do not manage to answer in time, they have to sit in the middle of the circle (the chicken coop).

The game continues as you ask different students questions. If they don’t know the answer, they may ask the student(s) in the chicken coop for help. If a student in the chicken coop answers a question correctly, they get to rejoin the circle. Consider creating safety rules with this game, as students can get quite rowdy with the rubber chicken!

Snowball Fight

Recreate a snowball fight inside the classroom! For this game, each student writes three review sentences or questions on individual pieces of paper and then balls up the pieces of paper to create snowballs. Divide students up into smaller groups or teams and have them stand together. 

For the snowball fight, students take turns throwing their snowballs at members of opposing teams. The student who is hit by the snowball has to answer that question correctly to remain in the game. If they answer wrongly, they are out. The game continues until all the snowballs are used up and/or there is only one team left standing. 

Around the World 

Travel the world with test prep with this game! The aim of the game is for a student to travel around the room and arrive back at their seat. Start by having one student stand up next to a seated student. Ask the pair of them a test review question and the one who answers correctly first gets to move up to the next “point on the map” while the other sits down. Continue in this manner until the timer runs out or you complete the list of review questions. The winner is the student who has moved the farthest from their original seat!

Consider incorporating “mandatory layovers” for students who have answered a set number of questions correctly (3-5) in a row by making them sit down to give other students a chance to move.

Test prep time can be a fun and engaging experience for your students with these interactive activities! Looking for more test prep ideas for your middle school students? Check out these resources:

• 3 Review Games to Help Your Middle School Students Prepare for Testing 

• 5 Popular Test Review Games For Middle Schoolers

• December ELA Activities to Keep Students Engaged

The post Review Games To Make Test Prep Fun appeared first on Read to Lead.

Engage Students in Relatable, Rigorous and Immersive Content

With Read to Lead, students immerse themselves in engaging storylines and work through complex decision-making processes. What advice do you give a student pharmacist about to graduate who is torn between two career paths? How do you balance a patient’s personal wishes against medical recommendations when it comes to taking a vaccine against COVID? In the wake of a hurricane, what is the best way to mobilize resources to help those in need?

In this interactive, game-based platform, students take on the role of a leader in an organization and navigate real-life scenarios in a virtual workplace. Each game completed on the platform is the equivalent of reading 3,000 – 5,000 words, and students develop literacy and life skills through standards-aligned gameplay. The games also include formative assessments that are differentiated to each student’s ability level and aligned to Common Core ELA standards. If you’re looking for fun, rigorous, and engaging test-prep material, Read to Lead has you covered!

Use Real-Time Performance Reports to Know Where Each Student Stands 

Part of the test prep process is keeping track of students’ performance so that you know where to differentiate learning and can step in to lend a hand when needed. But grading hundreds of student assessments is time-consuming and tedious.

Read to Lead allows you to spend less time grading with formative assessments that are automatically graded within the platform. Formative assessments are a useful tool for teachers to gauge student understanding and ability during the learning process, so that they can better cater to student needs. With this in mind, Read to Lead is designed with several features to help teachers track ELA growth.

The Gradebook feature shows how each student performed in each game and where they might need more practice or support. Get an overview of the class performance, or zoom in to each individual student for more detailed insights about their performance. Within the Gradebook view, teachers can review each individual student’s work to clearly understand students’ particular strengths and weaknesses. All reports can easily be saved as a PDF, printed out for quick reference, or emailed out as needed. With this deep understanding of where they stand, you can more effectively support your students to achieve better results during testing season.

The platform also allows you to generate Performance Reports not only for English Language Arts (ELA) skills but also Social Emotional Learning (SEL) in real-time so you always have a pulse on how each student is progressing. For a deeper dive at the class level, you can also choose to select specific ELA or SEL competencies from the dropdown menu. By selecting the skill you want to focus on, you can easily see at a glance how many students performed at the different levels – Beginner, Progressing, Strong, or Not Attempted. Additionally, you can track trends in your class performance based on specific ELA skills and evaluate how your class is performing over time.

Easily Differentiate Learning to Reach Students Where They Are

Every class has students of different needs and abilities, but this year, in particular, the differences are much more pronounced with students coming in after two years of remote and hybrid learning. It is not unusual to find a varied range of understanding or capabilities for different skills within a single class. That’s why many teachers are incorporating differentiated learning in their classrooms. But with over 25 students in each class, it’s hard to provide individual attention to each, and besides, who has time to create that many customized lesson plans?  

That’s why we created the Game Recommendations feature for Read to Lead games. Meet each student at their level and help them build their literacy and leadership skills gradually by using this incredible feature. Within the Performance Report tab, head over to Skill Insights to see the learning games the platform recommends for your students. The platform automatically takes into consideration their past performance and the skills they need more practice with to recommend suitable games, so you can be sure that your students will be effectively prepared for the testing season.

Test prep can be challenging, but with Read to Lead, you can make this whole process fun and effective, both for your students and yourself! Getting started with Read to Lead is easy – simply sign up for a free educator account, and dive right into your students’ best testing season yet! Click here to sign up for Read to Lead!

The post Making Test Prep Fun and Effective- Here’s how! appeared first on Read to Lead.

You have come to the end of a chapter or unit, and now it is time to prepare your students for the test. It can be tough to engage students with traditional study guides, and middle schoolers present additional challenges. If we are being honest, watching students struggle to review their notes and complete their guide isn’t much fun for us teachers either.

Looking for ways to liven up your reviews? With more and more classrooms having access to technology, teachers can create fun and engaging review games to help students prepare for upcoming assessments. Here are some games to help reinforce skills in a fun and educational way that are guaranteed to have your students looking forward to the next test.

???? Quizizz

Quizizz is a free fun multiplayer classroom review tool that allows students to practice and learn together. It’s easy to create quizzes and fun to use with avatars, leaderboards, themes, music and memes to keep your students engaged. There are many educators who created public quizizz that are either skills or standards-based. Teachers can access detailed class and student-level data at the end of each quiz, which provides insight into the entire class.

???? Kahoot

Kahoot is a game-based classroom response system played by the whole class in real time. Multiple choice questions are projected on the screen. Students answer the questions with their smartphone, tablet or computer.

???? Stinky Feet

The rules are simple. Students are to answer questions in teams using the “numbered heads together cooperative learning strategy.” Any and all teams whose answers are correct get to choose a sticky note from the Stinky Feet poster. Each sticky note has a point value on it, some positive points and some negative.

Snowball Fight

For this game, everyone writes one review sentence or question on a piece of paper. Students stand in a circle around the room. Everyone balls up their paper into a ball and throws it into the middle of the circle. Each student picks up someone else’s snowball and reads the sentence aloud or answers the question.

???? Around the World

The goal is for a student to go all the way around the room and get back to their own seat first. The player who does so wins the game. Begin at the front of the classroom at the first seat in a row. The student from that seat stands next to the next seated student. Show both students a card with a review question. The first student to say the correct answer gets to move to the next seated student. The student who loses sits down. If a student answers five consecutive questions, they sit down and play begins with two new challenges.

Preparing for tests can be stressful for students and teachers. Whether you are using technology or not, spice up your reviews in order to make test prep a bit more enjoyable for everyone!

Are you looking for more ways to engage your middle school students? Visit bit.ly/platformreadtolead to learn more about our research-based learning approach which combines innovative learning games, data-driven tools, and educator resources to personalize learning for all youth in grades 5-9.

The post 5 Popular Test Review Games For Middle Schoolers appeared first on Read to Lead.

It is almost that time of year again: Time for end of the year testing. Teachers are trying to get through everything in the curriculum, and cover material they anticipate being on these assessments, while also trying to keep students from burning out.  

Along with reviewing curriculum and digging into new content, students are also learning test-taking strategies. This means students are being bombarded with information, which when you add standardized testing to the mix, can be a very stressful time for students. During this time of the year, teachers can let students know they are more than simply a test score. Here are a number of ways to support students through this intense time.

One of the most important things that we can do for our students is to help them to  believe in their ability to succeed in achieving their goals. Student efficacy can be built by giving students opportunities to be successful, allowing them to see their peers succeed and by providing them with positive feedback. When students believe in themselves, they are motivated to try hard.  

Another strategy, which is closely related to student efficacy, is instilling a growth mindset. Students with a growth mindset know that their abilities can be developed through hard work and perseverance. We have to help students change their perspective. Instead of saying this test is hard, try challenges help me grow.  

Providing daily motivation is another simple way to support students during testing. You can write some encouraging words on post its and leave them on your students desks. You could also write a message on the board. Just imagine the feeling your students will get when they walk into the room and see a message saying how much you believe in them.  

Another way to support our students is by creating brain breaks. These can be done during test prep and during the test. Before you move on to the next section of the test, give your students the opportunity to stand up and stretch. Try doing yoga. Allow them to talk to each other. Consider adding game-based learning, such as Read to Lead. This will relieve some of the stress that many students will  undoubtedly feel.

Students are under enormous pressure to perform well on end of year testing. Educators can help relieve some of the pressure on our students by reminding them that even though the test is important, it does not define who they are. Most importantly, we must help them to believe in themselves and let them know that we believe in them as well.  

The post How to Support Your Students Through End of Year Testing appeared first on Read to Lead.

With end of year testing coming up in just a couple of months, it’s never too soon to start brainstorming fun ways to engage your students in test prep. We’ve come up with three different games designed to entertain AND educate your students so that they can put their best foot forward later this spring.

???? Pass the Chicken

For this review game, have all of your students sit in a circle. Randomly ask a student a test review question while the chicken is slowly passed around the entire circle. If the rubber chicken arrives back at the student before they answer, the student will have to go and sit in the middle (chicken coop) of the circle. If a student answers correctly, then (and only then), can the student holding the chicken can squeak it in celebration!

The chicken is then passed to the next person, etc. If a student doesn’t answer the review question correctly, they can ask the student/s in the chicken coop if they know the right answer. If the chicken coop student is correct, they can re-join the circle and the student who was unsure of the question can remain in the circle as well. Naturally, consider creating some safety rules since students tend to get rough with the rubber chicken!

Time Commitment for Activity Prep
• Low, only test review question prep

Supplies Needed
• Rubber chicken
• Test review questions

???? Jeopardy!

Credit: Teachers Pay Teachers

Always a classic, this game can be done using a whiteboard, blackboard, Smartboard, or PowerPoint. There are a plethora of downloadable Jeopardy formats online, but essentially you’ll need to create questions and answers worth a specific amount of fake money (or points).

The prep for Jeopardy can be as simple or intensive as you have time for.  All you really need to do is determine the categories based on the topics you want them to review and simply glance at your notes and choose a question’s difficulty based on the dollar amount.

Credit: Teachers Pay Teachers

Divide the students into two teams where one student is elected team leader. Each team member should take a turn to select a category and amount, for example, “Poetry for $400, Mr. Jenkins”. If the student answers the question correctly, the team leader adds the cash to the “Jeopardy Jar”. Determine the winner based on which team has the most amount of accrued fake money and award each team member a small prize or “class coupon”.

Activity Prep Time Needed
• Medium, creation of game board and questions may take some time

Supplies Needed
• Whiteboard, blackboard, Smartboard, or PowerPoint
• Fake money or other way of tracking points
• “Jeopardy Jar” – Clear container for each team, or a fun money holder like this one
• Test review questions

???? Knockout, inspired by Ms. Torres’ Classroom

Credit: Laura Torres

This review requires a little bit of crafting, but you can re-use it for years! On a piece of foam board use hot glue to line plastic cups in rows making sure to leave at least half an inch between the rims. When the glue is dry, drop in a review question and a little prize.

Next, cut tissue paper into squares large enough to wrap around the cup that you’ll secure with a rubber band. In class, call students up one at a time and have them select a cup and punch through the tissue paper to get to the question and prize. If they can answer the question correctly, they can keep the prize. If not, the first student to raise their hand with the correct answer can claim the prize for themselves (limit 2 per student).

Activity Prep Time Needed
• High, crafting the board and cups and then adding tissue paper may be intensive depending on how big you make the board.

Supplies Needed
• Test review questions on slips of paper
• Foam board/s depending on how big you want it
• Plastic cups (we recommend 16oz)
• Tissue paper
• Rubber bands
• Prizes like “class coupons” or one of these to match the theme

Credit: Composition Classroom Blog

BONUS: Have students collaborate on a design for a trendy classroom test reminder poster called DAB:

D = determine what the question is asking
A = ask yourself what can be eliminated
B = best answer selection

Do you have a clever or creative way to help your students review test materials? Let us know in the comment box below!

Ready for more fun? We’ve developed 3 games, 44 episodes, 150 hours of lesson plans, game performance reports, and 24/7 support await you and your students—at no cost!

The post 3 Review Games to Help Your Middle School Students Prepare for Testing appeared first on Read to Lead.