Korean Job Discussion Forums

[last goodbye]

What you think about using it in the classroom?

I see it as good spelling/phonics review and, more importantly, fun.

[sojourner1]

It's not bad as long as you relate the puzzle to your lesson and then get everyone to say it when it's solved. A lot of teachers knock hangman, because it redundantly used by inexperienced teachers who don't know what else to do to fill time. It's OK to use as long as you don't over do it and you relate to what you taught. Same for videos.

[Zulethe]

I love hangperson. I use it to apply attention and disciplinary tactices.

The losing team gets to "hang" themselves by my tie. I only let them hang for a few minutes before they pass out.

I told them not to tell anyone and so far it has worked. I think they get some kind of aphixiation high or something.

It's a great game that keeps all interested; either the one being hung or the one about to be!

[yingwenlaoshi]

I don't use it. In fact, I don't play any games at all. Sometimes I show videos. I used to play cards with students, but the class sizes are too big where I teach now. Card games maybe once or twice a week per class (where I taught them Mon to Fri). Pretty useless when you have more than six or seven students in a class. It teaches them to only use English. Anyway, I just teach. Couldn't be bothered with games.

[sojourner1]

The best game with big classes I've found so far is where you throw a ball to students to get them to answer or speak. It works wonders. Try it. A simple ball game is so effective in teaching vs. asking for them to raise their hand and speak, because they won't do that in many situations. I was quite amazed when I started doing this 2 weeks ago. Try many things besides hangman. The problem with hangman, especially in large classes, is it gets to be a loud Korean speaking situation and then it takes time (Korean speaking starts up due to boredom) for you to write it out, but I suppose it could be done on the video screens.

[pcs0325]

I play hangman in several classes just because we finish early and the kids love the game. For the most part, it's just a game, but I recently started playing hangman with the kindie kids and found its value.

Hangman is a really valuable game for the kindie kids because even though they know a lot of words they still can't spell those words. Also, it helps with their pronunciation of letters. I go by what I hear and if they complain, once I write the mistaken letter on the board, I tell them they have to improve their pronunciation if they want me to judge the letter correctly.

[Smee]

I don't like it. i'd rather do a crossword puzzle---if I have one made up for the lesson---or 20 questions.

Plus, Hangman has kind of violent imagery that I don't want to bring into the classroom.

[pcs0325]

I really like 20 questions. It teaches them to think critically in order to narrow the search space. I try to set an example, and often impress them, with guessing any number a given student chooses between 1-10,000 using a binomial search (e.g., The first question is, "Is the number greater than 5000", if "no", then the next question is, "Is the number greater than 2500", etc.).

Yeah. about the violence in Hangman. One of my kindie classes once asked me what the gallows I drew was for, so I explained to them about hanging people... that didn't go over well; They all got scared.

[Scotticus]

[Tiberious aka Sparkles]

[yingwenlaoshi]

My students stop saying "game" pretty quickly. I think of game playing as more work for me and useless for them. I give them downtime once in a while, but then it's on to teaching and learning and reviewing what we've learned. Then I go home. If they don't like it, there's a door they can use. I fkn hate those stupid games. Kids just fk around and start yammering on in Korean. Maybe if they didn't, I might consider something more fun. Until that time, they don't get sweet f all but my smiling face and encouragement.

Hangman is stupid. There's the word. Learn to spell it.

And that ball throwing game? Let's say Minsu goes to the States with his parents:

Mother: "Why didn't you speak English to that man?"

Minsu: "He didn't throw me a ball."

Anyway, if you play games, all the power to you. I'm not criticizing you. It's up to you. If it makes your day go by quicker then great.

[Justin Hale]

I almost never use games anymore either, but when I did, I used a variant of hangman as follows:

A. Use points instead of the hanging man....

one point per letter (so 2 a's = 2 points)
ten points per word
minus 3 points per letter guessed incorrectly
minus 5 points per word guessed incorrectly

B. Have several words rather than just one (all of which, obviously, blanked out). Easy example....

1. red
2. blue
3. black
4. white
5. brown
6. green
7. yellow

C. Have one more word in brackets (which is a hint word), so in the above example it'd be colors in brackets. There are millions of games available, like adjectives, countries, languages, clothes, weather, sports, family, musical instruments, months, planets, and so on.

D. Always have students ask the following questions rather than just shout out letters and words....

- do any words contain L?
- is word number 3 'black'?
- is the hint word 'colors'?

E. Players or teams can guess a maximum of one letter and one word per turn and a minimum of one word or one letter

[cj1976]

I rarely play it. When I do, it is to reinforce new vocabulary.
For those super PC liberal types put there, if you truly think it is too violent then change the picture.
I have used a 'person' in a parachute hovering over a shark. Erase the ropes of the chute rather than draw the hangman frame.
Alternatively a man dangling from a tree above a big pile of shit goes down well here.
In Korea drawing turds is cool.

[Zutronius]

I use it to get students thinking of what ending to use on certain words.

Example: Observance...Observ_ _ _ _

Other than that I don't use it because I feel it's a time filler.

[MaestroCantus]

I use hangman, and my students love it. They're always guessing letters like "X" or "Q," and I have no clue why, because the phrases are almost always some phrase we covered in class.

I find it useful to teach the kids to pronounce English letters correctly . . . thay have a hard time distinguishing B and V, N and M, etc. (I try not to answer unless they clearly say the letter . . . which makes them really frustrated sometime and they'll sometime point at the letter, but I wait for them to say it correctly after asking, "Do you want V?").

It's a good game at the end of class to keep the kids involved rather than arguing that the class is over. (They can get really competitive with each other).