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Valentine Battleship


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Students worked hard all week? Do they deserve a special reward for a job well done? This activity will offer students a nice break from structured learning. Adapt it to fit your needs. Have some Friday Fun!

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Teacher Mona Grayson is always on the lookout for opportunities to integrate timely subjects and topics with regular classroom activities. When her class was studying how to plot points and coordinates, she immediately thought of the children's game Battleship -- and added a holiday twist!

"Valentine Battleship was a huge success!" Grayson told Education World. "Not only was it a really fun way to practice what we were learning in math, it also acknowledged that it was a holiday and that there was excitement in the air."

Because Grayson didn't have the resources to get her hands on 16 sets of the real Battleship game, she decided to make my own. In her version of the game, students sit in pairs.

  • Each student conceals his or her workspace with a privacy folder, and secretly places six conversation hearts at intersections on a grid labeled A-G on the bottom (x-axis) and 1-8 on the left side (y-axis).
  • Then, students take turns guessing in (x,y) format the location of the hearts.
  • If a "hit" is made, the successful guesser takes the conversation heart and guesses again. If a guess is incorrect, the player crosses off the incorrect coordinate and the other player takes a turn.
  • The winner is the first player to collect his or her opponent's six candies.

Click the link below for more information about the game, more ideas from Mona Grayson, and a reproducible work sheet that students can use as they play the game.

READ MORE

Education World Teacher Feature: Mona Grayson
Education World (February 7, 2005)

Find links to more Friday Fun activity ideas in our Friday Fun archive.

Find more great learning games in our Learning Game Archive.

Article by Gary Hopkins
Education World®
Copyright © 2006 Education World

07/21/2006