#  >> K-12 >> K-12 Basics

Science Project Activity: Making a Game Board

Making a board game is a creative way to teach students about many topics, science included. Form groups of four or five students and ask them to make their own science themed game board. After they complete it, other classmates get to try out the game. Each group should be given a different subtopic to allow a variety of possible end products, as well as trivia questions.
  1. Assign a Topic

    • Each group should be assigned a specific topic. Give your students completely different science disciplines to explore, such as biology, chemistry and physics, or assign subtopics of the same category. For example, if you are a biology teacher, you could assign the groups specific organs as the theme for their game boards, or they could each cover different branches of biology such as anatomy, physiology or genetics.

    Define Roles

    • To ease the whole process, define the different roles and ask each group to assign specific functions to each team member. To make a game board you will need an artist, a scribe, a materials manager and a project manager. Regardless of the specific role, every student should get involved in the research aspect of the project.

    Research

    • Using textbooks and other reference materials such as books in your school library, an encyclopedia or the Internet, your students need to research their given topics and come up with a series of questions that will be asked during the game. Ask them to come up with about 100 questions in total. Some of these may be multiple choice questions, others open ended questions, and a few true or false. Each question should be written on a separate card with the type of question indicated on the back of the card.

    Design the Game Board

    • Using a large sheet of cardboard, place a start and a finish box. In between, there should be at least 20 spaces where the players' icons will move. Label each square with a category of questions such as "True or False," "Multiple Choice" or "Open-Ended." Add a science related icon to represent different challenges. Find objects to represent each player and use one die to play the game.

    Write the Rules

    • The final step in board game creation is to write the set of rules. In this document, you should define the object of the game, the equipment necessary, the setup of the board and the rules of play. Feel free to add in fun challenges and non-science related trivia to spice up the game.

Learnify Hub © www.0685.com All Rights Reserved