Fast and furious, fun and frantic and just silly to boot. I give unto thee a plethora of games for the simple pleasure of group fun and social bonding. WARNING: Some of these games may not directly promote higher level thinking! Be forewarned that madcap rumpusing may ensue!

Dancing Eggs by HABA is, as you see, an egg carton filled with 2 die and 10 eggs. The goal of the game is to collect as many eggs as possible. How do we collect said eggs? By rolling the red die which has a series of tasks associated with the faces. You may have to be the first to run around the table, to cluck like a chicken, to snatch the die, or to catch one of the rubber eggs as it is bounced off of the table.

Enter die #2, the dreaded WHITE die. This is the die that you roll after you win an egg that tells you WHERE you need to keep that egg for the remainder of the game. SOOOOOO, you may need to prop that egg under your chin, in the crook of your elbow, or between your knees. Now imagine running around the table with an egg under your neck, your armpit and between your knees. Not so easy!

The game continues until one person drops an egg, at which point all of the players add up the eggs that they managed to keep. The rubber eggs are worth 1 point, while the wooden egg (which is much more difficult to keep a hold of) is worth two. Fast! Frantic! Fun, Fun, Fun!

Say Anything by North Star Games LLC is a clever twist on the standard party question game. In the game, players take turns asking questions that can be fairly open to interpretation. If you are playing with students, scan the cards for the few that are definite no-no’s and remove them before play. After the question is asked, each of the other players writes their answers down on a dry erase board and place them out for everyone to see.

<yawn> Boring, right? Hold it now…. hit it! The person who asked the question now selects their favorite answer from those written by the other players. Once the secret selecting has been done, then each of the players place two tokens on the answers they think that the questioner may have chosen. This may be their own answer or another player’s. They can split their chips or place them both on one answer. Say Anything has players crafting answers based on the person asking the questions and reflecting again once all of the answers are played out. It is a wonderful way for students to put themselves in the perspective of their peers. They often will be pleasantly surprised at what they learn about the people they are around each and every day.

Castle Knights: Together we are Strong is a great dexterity game by HABA for the kiddies, though I am a tower building junkie I admit. Up to four players can take part as they take an end of an elastic strap that, when pulled tight, expands a central elastic square. Racing against the clock, students need to work together through communication and coordination to erect three towers before the king arrives at the castle.

In typical HABA fashion, the components are top notch. Each of the tower pieces are big and chunky pieces of wood in varying shapes and sizes and the game box serves as the castle grounds. Students young and old, love the pressure as they struggle to gather the pieces, secure, move and balance them one atop another in the race to build the towers. Communication is a must in this game as students need to work together to orient themselves so they can master these feats of dexterity.

Not every gaming experience need to tie so strongly to the curriculum. Our students need time to interact and relate with each other in ways that will help them develop bonds and grow as individuals, finding their place within the social strata of school. Games create a community of play that sets its own guidelines for interaction that often supersede the chosen divisions of cliches and niches inherent in youth. For those brief moments, students are simply in the moment… working together. A skill we could stand to hold onto well into adulthood.

Werewolf

Number of Players: 8 to ???

Grade Levels: Middle School and Up

Length: 20 to 30 Minutes

Curricular Connections: Storytelling, Characterization, Persuasive Language, Critical Listening, Deduction

Investment: Low
Return: High

A brief history of…. the werewolf!

Werewolf is derivative of the mafia party game created in 1986 by Dimma Davidoff at the Psychological Department of Moscow State University. The werewolf theme was applied in 1986 by Andrew Plotkin and the game has had subsequent publishing by various companies including: daVinci games, Looney Labs,  Mayfair Games, Asmodee Editions, and Bezíer Games. Publications of note for school libraries include the Asmodee Edition: Werewolves of Millers Hollow, which handles 8-18 players and the Bezíer Games version: Ultimate Werewolf: Ultimate Edition which handles 5-68 players. The Asmodee version has the most school appropriate art work on the cards while the Bezíer version easily handles a whole class and provides the best guidance for getting started and running the game.

Did you hear something?

Werewolf is a captivating social game in which players are secretly assigned roles that they must play out over the course of the game. The story is that werewolves have infiltrated a small country village, stealing away another victim each night. By day these creatures could be any one of the citizens, leaving the town no choice but to elect one member of its village to pay for the continuing atrocities. It is this act of nominating that lies at the heart of the game, as students use language and social interaction to help them accuse others and defend themselves. The game is over when either all of the villagers or werewolves have been removed from the game.

Game play is open and unique for each experience. The roles themselves are minimally defined, leaving the direction and depth of the game in the hands of the students playing the game. The basic games features three roles: villagers, the seer and the werewolves. The majority of players will receive villager roles, playing the game to discover who amongst them are werewolves. A handful of students will be receive the role of werewolf. These few come together each night to select one player to remove from the game each night.  By day they try to blend with the rest of the village, seeming as outraged and accusatory as the rest of the village. If one of their own is nominated in the morning, they need to try to shift attention if the group is uncertain and follow suit if there is certainty. A very delicate position to play. The last role, the seer, is usually given to one player who can ask the identity of one player each night and use that information as they see fit.

To play, students receive their cards and are told the back story by a moderator. The moderator’s role is key in creating an engaging experience, their enthusiasm and demeanor can make or break an experience. After the story has been set, the village falls asleep (closes their eyes) and the moderator asks for the werewolves to open their eyes, recognize each other and select a villager to take away in the night. They go back to sleep and the seer is asked to open their eyes and select villager for which the moderator silently gestures their role (usually making a “V” or “W” with their fingers). Next comes morning, with the moderator building suspense until indicating which villager was taken away during the night. They remove themselves from the group and watch the rest of the game from the side, there are some roles that allow some of these villagers to still participate in the game.

Now comes the meat of the game, the village must vote to select one villager to stand trial for the crime. There are no real rules for this process, except that nominated villagers have an opportunity to defend themselves. Here, students have an opportunity to immerse themselves in the game and the story. They are not only playing the game but becoming an active part of the experience. They must be persuasive, critical or inspiring depending on the situation that has developed and the role that they have. It is a storytelling experience of a different caliber and one that should be experience by every student. This cycle of night and day is repeated until one group alone remains, villagers or werewolves.

Modifications:

The game I described has been modified from the basic game, but only slightly and not in any way that detracts from the experience. In the regular game villagers are killed by

the werewolves and nominated villagers and lynched by the crowd. Adjusting this language for a school environment is a slight and superficial change that allows the value of the gaming experience to

be utilized as a classroom tool. Additional modifications include the inclusion of a variety of roles that come with the different editions of the game. The Bezíer version, Ultimate Werewolf, has the most comprehensive collection of roles with good descriptions of their part in the game.

A naked American man stole my balloons.

Werewolf allows students to become storytellers. It creates a venue for students to not only create but take part in a fun and fascinating tale of mistrust and solidarity. It is a wonderful exercise in the use of persuasive language and critical listening and with slight modifications to the language of the game, students from middle and high school can, for a few moments, loose themselves in a familiar yet fantastic world.

I nominate you as the werewolf!

Well, the book is finished and off at the editors.  There may be some more work to tweek things, but “Libraries Got Game” is complete coming out in the fall from ALA Editions. I have to say a big THANKS to Chris Harris, my co-author for all of his help putting this book together. When I was first approached to write a book, I knew that I did not want to tackle it on my own. My newness to writing needed a seasoned hand to help craft what is a fantastic look at modern board games as educational resources.

Chris did a wonderful job of talking “big picture” and looking at the research, the history of games and bringing things together. My focus was extending my curriculum work, writing  about the games and their alignment, matching games with local state learning standards and providing connections to library and information skills. Additionally, I put together some great recommended games lists for elementary, middle and high school. Together, I think we have put together a really good resource for school libraries looking to expand their collection and include additional resources that can help engage students with learning.

I will keep everyone up to date with details of the books release when we have them. Plus I am sure there will be more to share in July at ALA. If you are interested in learning how to expand your resource collection to include games, please consider attending our ALA pre-conference Gaming in the School Library: Curriculum Aligned and Still Fun! We will be sharing so much of our work and experience, including: selection criteria, recommended lists of titles, advocacy and alignment tools and more. Of course, a preconference on games would not be complete without lots of hands-on time with the resources with discussions on implementation.

I hope to see you there and thank all of you for your support of gaming in the school environment.

I didn’t want to be a stranger too much as I work on the board game book for ALA. We had a snag along the way that set us back a month, but we are heading along now and see the light! In the meantime, I wanted to share another great site with two great opportunities. Funagain Games is an online board game retailer that understands and supports educators.

Why do tell!

For the last six months, Funagain has been giving away two monthly gaming grants:

“Funagain Games believes board games are a great way to promote education, learning and community outreach. As such Funagain Games is proud to announce a monthly grant program dedicated to providing games to organizations that further those ideals in their daily work. Each month Funagain Games will provide a $100 grant to a school, library, or community organization, and another to a game group, to be used for any merchandise offered on the Funagain website.”

With Funagain’s selection, this is a wonderful opportunity for a small library or classroom to start a gaming collection. In addition to the monthly gaming grants, Funagain is also running a contest for upcoming Earth Day:

“Funagain Games is encouraging kids and teachers to participate in the Arthur Saves the Planet Giveaway Contest! Kids can win a copy of Arthur Saves the Planet: The Boardgame for their classroom. The contest is open to any child in grades K-3, living in the US.”

Arthur Saves the Planet is a new game designed by Mike Siggins and distributed by FRED Distribution aimed at introducing primary and elementary level students to more sophisticated play mechanics while educating them about environmental issues. With a few slight modifications to play, the game has the potential to work well with students.

If all this were not enough, THEY TAKE PURCHASE ORDERS! I have yet to find another online board game retailer that accepts purchase orders, so this is a rare thing indeed. They just get educators; the opportunities, selection and ease of access garners my respect and thanks.

If you have not had a chance to take a look at Games for Educators, I highly recommend that you take a few minutes. They are a great resource for information and ideas regarding using games as educational resources. With a growing forum and a great podcast featuring Giles Pritchard and Tom Vasel.

Currently, they are running a contest looking for stories where games are used in education. The winner, to be chosen on May 1st, will receive $100 worth of board games from Out of the Box Games. The prize package includes:

ZenBenders
Backseat Drawing
Rock
10 Days in USA
10 Days in Europe
My Word

If you have a story to share, take some time and share your success with your peers… who knows!

Number of Players: 2 (easily playable in teams)

Grade Levels: Middle School and Up

Length: 20 to 30 Minutes

Investment: Low
Return: High

ELA Standards:
Standard 1: Students will read, write, listen and speak for information and understanding.

AASL Standards:
1.1.2: Use prior/background knowledge as context for new learning
1.2.5 Demonstrate adaptability by changing inquiry focus… or strategies when necessary to achieve success
4.1.5 Connect ideas to own interests and previous knowledge and experience

I love to play with words. I enjoy doing crossword puzzles, but not the word search, and ever since I got my iPod Touch, I have played through a slew of word games. Word Warp has stood the test of time above all others I have tried. Looking to the table, I haven’t been overwhelmed with what I have found in the modern board game market. There are some great word games that are very enjoyable, but they don’t scratch that same itch. That all changed as I sat down and had a chance to try LetterFlip from Out of the Box Publishing.

LetterFlip is a two-player game of deduction and wordsmithing. Each player has a rack with the letters of the alphabet. They use these letters to keep track of their guesses as they work their way through a string of words, progressively gaining difficulty. If a letter is not in the word they flip it down, if it is they keep it up. Similar to hangman, LetterFlip has players working through their word patterns in an effort to deduce their mystery word. What sets this game apart are the additional questions and details in the game that really make it engaging.

First, apart from asking if letters are a part of a word, players can also ask the placement of already known letters. “Is “r” the third letter?” This extra information inspires students to really examine how words are put together. If I am working on a four-letter word and I already have an “e”, an “a” and an “r”, I can start to run through arrangements of those letters and making educated ventures from there. I might start with “*ear” or “*are” words. Asking letter position is key in working out this information.

One other nice detail is the ability to track letters during the course of the game. Whenever a player correctly guesses a letter they find out how many times it appears in the word they are working on. They then slide an indicator built into the letter up to let them know how many times it appears in the word. While not necessary, it is a very nice detail that allows the players to focus on the puzzle rather than remembering the details.

I LOVE LetterFlip. While not necessarily a new game concept, it brings word deduction together in a well produced and engaging game that lets students build their vocabulary and word skills in a fun and challenging way. While this is a two-player game, it works well with teams of students helping each other making it a great choice for classrooms and libraries.

BRING TO ME A GAME THAT CHALLENGES STUDENTS AND CAPTURES THE FLAVOR OF THE GREAT EGYPTIAN DYNASTY!

SO LET IT BE WRITTEN, SO LET IT BE DONE!

Number of Players: 3 to 5

Grade Levels: Middle School and Up

Length: 45 Minutes

Investment: Medium
Return: High

Social Studies 2: Students will use a variety of intellectual skills to demonstrate their understanding of major ideas, eras, themes, developments, and turning points in world history and examine the broad sweep of history from a variety of perspectives.
Social Studies 3: Students will use a variety of intellectual skills to demonstrate their understanding of the geography of the interdependent world in which we live—local, national, and global—including the distribution of people, places, and environments over the Earth’s surface.

AASL Standards:
1.1.2: Use prior/background knowledge as context for new learning
1.2.5 Demonstrate adaptability by changing inquiry focus… or strategies when necessary to achieve success
2.4.4 Develop directions for further investigations
4.1.5 Connect ideas to own interests and previous knowledge and experience

Rio Grande’s Amun-Re provides a glimpse into Egypt’s past as players strive to leave their mark on history. They hope to accomplish this through erecting pyramids and building prosperous kingdoms along the Nile. Each player, acting as a pharaoh, builds their kingdom by bidding on available provinces along the great Nile River. Each province has potential for helping the pharaoh by providing resources, religious power and political influence. Provinces feature a space for farmers to harvest the land and an area for erecting pyramids to commemorate your power. Some provinces come with resources, political potential in the way of power cards, economic assistance, and religious power. Each province’s resources and potential are different. Provinces along the Nile are more fertile than those further away, offering more spaces for farmers to harvest the land.

Game play is broke into 2 stages, the Old Kingdom and the New Kingdom. Play is identical in each kingdom with players first bidding on provinces. Once a province has been purchased by each player, players may then take turns purchasing resources. These include farmers to harvest the land, bricks which upgrade to pyramids, and power cards which influence game play and possible goals that, if archived, give extra victory points when scoring. Players then offer a sacrifice of gold to the temple. How much is sacrificed influences how prosperous a return the gods provide on your harvest. The additional benefit from the harvest is that players get to pick additional farmers, bricks or cards based on how much they sacrificed.

After players have gotten their income based on the harvest and any additional items based on their sacrifice, it is a simple rinse and repeat for five more rounds. So, once you get students familiar with a game round they will be comfortable with the rest of the game. After three rounds, players will score themselves based on the number of pyramids they have built, any temples in their provinces and any bonus points they may have earned for power card achievements. The power cards points are usually based around where you settled (i.e. all provinces on the bank of the Nile) or your resources (i.e. having 8 or more farmers).

After scoring, time passes and the New Kingdom ends and ushers in the New Kingdom. Everything on the board is wiped away except the pyramids which stand the test of time. Students play another three rounds using the same provinces that were used in the Old Kingdom. So if a mediocre province had several pyramids built in it, it suddenly becomes more desirable because those pyramids do not need to be built again! Play continues on until scoring, which adds onto the score from the old kingdom.

This is a game that I thought students wouldn’t get into, but they did. It works great as a resource for the sixth grade ancient civilizations unit along with other games like: Chang Cheng for ancient China and Tribune for ancient Rome. (I am anxiously awaiting a copy of Days of Wonder’s Colosseum to possibly include on that list.) The game does have a learning curve, but that is easily resolved by playing through a test round to let students get a feel for the flow of the game. When we used this game with a group of 6th grade students in the library, they loved the game so much they came back on their own after school to play another game.

Another benefit to the game is that it is language independent. All the elements in the game are represented with images making this great game for working with ESL students. This is a great game that really challenges middle school students to push their inquiry and critical thinking skills.

I give this game two Yul Brynners up!

What a hectic fall. I haven’t had the chance to post lately with all that has been going on. Along with my brilliant colleague, Andy Austin, I helped present a workshop in NYC on Drupal in Libraries. If you are unfamiliar with Drupal, it is an open-source content management system that allows you the freedom and flexibility to build something more than just a website.

Drupal is what I have been using this last month to build the new School Library System Game Library site that will be coming out after Thanksgiving Break. I am very excited about the new website. All the games in the game library (we made a small purchase this fall of new games to bring us close to 50 titles) will be cataloged and circulated through the website. But more importantly, they will all be tagged and searchable based on both the New York State Learning Standards and the AASL Standards for the 21st Century Learner.

Even more exciting, and what has been soooo time consuming, is that all the games will be tagged at the performance indicator level for the NYS Learning Standards. That fine grained level of alignment is going to be remarkably powerful in helping connect educators with games. Be sure to check the new site after the Thanksgiving break!

I also had the pleasure of being involved with three presentations at this year’s ALA TechSource Gaming, Learning and Libraries Symposium in Chicago at the beginning of November. If you did not have the chance to attend, please consider going next year. The opportunity to come together with other librarians from a myriad of areas and library types to discuss how gaming influences and impacts library services is a rare and precious opportunity.

The last bit of news is that, along with my colleague Christopher Harris, I am going to be writing a book for ALA on modern board games and libraries. Our focus will be on the value of games as educational resources. We plan on including all the alignment work we have been doing, our selection criteria for getting started, tips for advocacy and getting programs going in your library and much more. While the alignment work lends itself to school libraries, the book should hold value for public and academic libraries as well who are looking for a resource that covers tabletop games.

Whew! I will be sure to start writing about some more great games very soon now that the storm has calmed. Keep gaming and gobble gobble gobble!

Number of Players: 2 to 4

Grade Levels: Middle School and Up

Length: 45 Minutes

Investment: Medium
Return: Medium

MST Standard 3: Students will understand the concepts and become proficient with the skills of mathematics…
MST Standard 4: Students will use mathematical analysis, scientific inquiry, and engineering design, as appropriate, to pose questions, seek answers, and develop solutions.

1.1.2: Use prior/background knowledge as context for new learning
2.1.2 Organize knowledge so that it is useful
4.1.5 Connect ideas to own interests and previous knowledge and experience

Cowboys, gold mines, general stores and train stations, HEE HAW! When I bought Rio Grande’s Oregon, I was hoping I might have a game that introduces and reinforces some of the flavor of the westward expansion, little did I know that what I was getting was a math game… and a good one at that.

In Oregon, players are trying to build and lay claim to the newly discovered territory. They get points by having their little cowboy meeples next to building and mines. Players score points for themselves alone when they place the meeples. When buildings and mines are placed, any previously laid meeple surrounding the newly laid building, regardless of who they belong to, scores point. Got that?

Ready for the math? Meeples and features are played by using a cleaver modification of the Cartesian coordinate system. Featured across the top and side of the board are symbols marking the rows and columns.

Meeples are put on the board by playing two cards with symbols. The meeple can be played in either of the two corresponding grid spaces, since the symbols are repeated on both the x and the y axis. For example you could play in the fire/eagle section or the eagle/fire section. Buildings require only one symbol card and can be played anywhere along the matching row or column. Oh, did I mention that buildings have to match their corresponding terrain type?

Soon, the board starts to fill, as players try to to maneuver place buildings and meeples to score. Each building type has scoring rules and I found this to be the biggest hurdle to learning and teaching the game. The group I played with had to reference back to the rules several times to figure out how scoring works if you are placing a building versus placing a meeple. A quick search of the Geek found us a scoring guide that should help.

Overall, Oregon is a strong game and a good selection in the hard to fill math slot. If you enjoy the tile play of Carcasonne and are looking for a new challenge, then Oregon is a rewarding next step.

I want to take a minute to differentiate between authentic and educational games. In my opinion, many educational games fail in engaging the students in a meaningful and lasting way. Yes, students may take the turns and go through the game, but they don’t enjoy and get involved with educational games in the same manner they do with authentic games. That is because the engagement is not the same, they do not internalize those curricular pieces to the same degree as they do with authentic games.

If you bring to the table an authentic game, which also happens to have curricular connections, then you have something powerful. Students can see through educational games as another worksheet in disguise and they can get put off. With authentic games, the students are eager to succeed at the game and to do so they utilize the curricular, social and life skills that are a part of the game.

It is the same power that drives “real world” connections in the classroom. As educators, we try to make real world connections so that what we are teaching has context and takes on meaning with the students. Games create that context through well developed themes and meaning materializes as they strive to succeed.

I don’t mean to be down on “educational” games, but too often they miss the mark.