Five word games to get you through the Christmas season

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As it is Christmas this week, we’ve decided to share our top five word games with you – whether you have a houseful of guests to entertain, or are looking to while away a few hours between opening presents and Christmas dinner, these games are sure to keep you busy!

  1. Hangman
    It doesn’t seem right to put together a list of word games, without mentioning Hangman. Despite being almost every supply teacher’s go to lesson plan, this game is actually quite fun, and a good way of reusing scraps of wrapping paper once all the presents have been opened. If you’d like to play by yourself, we have our own online version of the game, Which Witch!
  2. Word Association
    Word Association is a great game to get you through long car journeys and awkward conversations. Stuck sitting next to someone you don’t know very well at a party? Word Association may be the perfect icebreaker. The starting player chooses a word at random to share with the group, and next player must say the first word that comes into their head upon hearing the first player’s word. The following player must then say the first word that comes into their head upon hearing the second player’s word and so on around the group for as long as you can keep it up – it might be worth setting a word or time limit though! If you’d prefer, the players could write down the words instead of saying them aloud. Why not start with a Christmas-themed word and see what you end up with?
  3. Collective Nouns
    A gaggle of geese…a herd or reindeer…a host of angels…a collective noun is the word used to describe a group of individuals. What are the most inventive collective nouns you can come up with? Some of the best ones we’ve come across include: a prickle of hedgehogs, a murder of crows, and a mischief of mice. What do you think a group of snowmen might be called? What about elves? Send us your ideas – we’d love to hear!
  4. Scrabble
    This game is better suited for a smaller group of people, but it is one of our absolute favourites. You can easily buy the game, or perhaps, if you’re feeling inventive, you could have a go at making your own set. If you prefer unscrambling words over putting them together, why not have a go at our Bouncing Anagram game?
     
  5. Articulate
    Articulate is the ultimate word game for a party. You can buy the board game or create your own version and tailor it to your occasion. Simply fill a bowl with slips of paper, each slip with a different word on it (such as places, famous people, book titles, objects, Christmas characters etc.). On their turn, each player must draw a slip from the bowl and describe whatever is written down without using any of the actual words on the paper, while the rest of the group try and guess what the word is. If you want to make this even harder, try splitting your guests into teams or adding a few more ‘banned words’ to the slips of paper (like in the board game Taboo).

What are your favourite word games? Send them to us and we’ll share them with our followers. And from all the team at Spellzone, have a wonderful Christmas!


23 Dec 2013
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One of the students has put in a huge amount of effort in completing Spellzone at least 3 times a week since his arrival with us in January. Looking at his scores after the latest GL testing, his standardised score has risen from 99 to 131. This is a truly phenomenal result. I just wanted to share the best result I have ever seen.

Terrie Penrose-Toms, Casterton College

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