Skip to main content

Five variations on bingo

Loto is a great game for classes. It is worthwhile for reinforcing number recognition, students enjoy it, it is a good class calmer if you need it and it needs no preparation so it's great to fall back on as a teacher. I'm talking about number bingo here, not bingo with pictures or vocabulary.

There are some easy variations if you want to get away from the standard "call out numbers" version. By the way, you can buy ready-made bingo cards with numbers 1-90 - it's a good to have a load of them in the cupboard - or students can just write down, say, 10 numbers in a range you give them. One advantage of having "official" cards is that you can do lines as well as the "full house".

1.  Mental arithmetic bingo

With this one, instead of reading out a number, you give classes a simple mental arithmetic sum to solve which leads to the number which may be on their card. You need to teach them simple terms like plus, moins, multiplié par and divisé par. The advantage of this variation is that it provides more mental challenge. The downside is that pupils don't make the immediate link between the number you read and the number written in front of them. You might also need quite a good class to do it.

2.  Reverse bingo ("death bingo")

In this variation all the class stands up. You call numbers and if a number comes up which is on a child's card, they must sit down and they are out of the game. This variation goes by quite quickly and is a fun alternative, but the obvious downside is that once a pupil is "out" they have no more motivation to listen to numbers.

3. Number sequence bingo.

Instead of just reading a number, you read simple sequences of numbers and pupils have to work out what the next number would have been. You can make this as simple or as hard as you want, depending on the class. e.g. 1,2,3,4 ___ . Or 64,32,16 __. You can cater for any number easily e.g. 5,4,3,2 __. I like this version because students get to hear a lot of numbers, so you are maximising input. the minor downside is that, as in mental arithmetic bingo, pupils do not make an immediate match between the number they hear and the number of the paper.

4. Group bingo

Just break the class into small groups and get one person to act as caller. This has the advantage of allowing some students to do the calling. The downside is that students may hear poorer models of pronunciation and there is the danger of an over-noisy classroom.

5. Number in a sentence bingo

In this variation, instead of reading out a number, you read a sentence containing the number. e.g. Il y a 30 personnes dans la classe; j'ai deux frères; le numéro soixante est intéressant. This has a greater level of challenge and is an opportunity to provide input at the sentence level, allowing pupils to hear numbers in context. Some classes may find it too hard and the teacher may need to do a bit of thinking beforehand about the nature of the sentences which are feasible. This may be a version to do with classes who have been studying at least a year.

Here are sites which will generate bingo cards for you.

http://print-bingo.com/
http://www.dltk-cards.com/bingo/bingo1.asp
https://bingobaker.com/

Comments

  1. love it! May I share some of these variations on my blog? (kelaskubermain) Obviously will reference & link back!
    Look forward to exploring further :)
    Danielle

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What is skill acquisition theory?

For this post, I am drawing on a section from the excellent book by Rod Ellis and Natsuko Shintani called Exploring Language Pedagogy through Second Language Acquisition Research (Routledge, 2014). Skill acquisition is one of several competing theories of how we learn new languages. It’s a theory based on the idea that skilled behaviour in any area can become routinised and even automatic under certain conditions through repeated pairing of stimuli and responses. When put like that, it looks a bit like the behaviourist view of stimulus-response learning which went out of fashion from the late 1950s. Skill acquisition draws on John Anderson’s ACT theory, which he called a cognitivist stimulus-response theory. ACT stands for Adaptive Control of Thought.  ACT theory distinguishes declarative knowledge (knowledge of facts and concepts, such as the fact that adjectives agree) from procedural knowledge (knowing how to do things in certain situations, such as understand and speak a language).

The 2026 GCSE subject content is published!

Two DfE documents were published today. The first was the response to the consultation about the proposed new GCSE (originally due in October 2021) and the second is the subject content document which, ultimately, is of most interest to MFL teachers in England. Here is the link  to the document.  We are talking about an exam to be done from 2026 (current Y7s). There is always a tendency for sceptical teachers to think that consultations are a bit of a sham and that the DfE will just go ahead and do what they want when it comes to exam reform. In this case, the responses to the original proposals were mixed, and most certainly hostile as far as exam boards and professional associations representing the MFL community, universities, head teachers and awarding bodies are concerned. What has emerged does reveal some significant changes which take account of a number of criticisms levelled at the proposals. As I read it, the most important changes relate to vocabulary and the issue of topics

La retraite à 60 ans

Suite à mon post récent sur les acquis sociaux..... L'âge légal de la retraite est une chose. Je voudrais bien savoir à quel âge les gens prennent leur retraite en pratique - l'âge réel de la retraite, si vous voulez. J'ai entendu prétendre qu'il y a peu de différence à cet égard entre la France et le Royaume-Uni. Manifestation à Marseille en 2008 pour le maintien de la retraite à 60 ans © AFP/Michel Gangne Six Français sur dix sont d’accord avec le PS qui défend la retraite à 60 ans (BVA) Cécile Quéguiner Plus de la moitié des Français jugent que le gouvernement a " tort de vouloir aller vite dans la réforme " et estiment que le PS a " raison de défendre l’âge légal de départ en retraite à 60 ans ". Résultat d’un sondage BVA/Absoluce pour Les Échos et France Info , paru ce matin. Une majorité de Français (58%) estiment que la position du Parti socialiste , qui défend le maintien de l’âge légal de départ à la retraite à 60 ans,