How can I handicap myself playing scrabble?

t.d. · Post by **t.d.** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 8:22 am

Hey, I got Scrabble to play with my Japanese friends to help their English. I play with them to keep the ball rolling but I need to find a way to handicap myself to even the playing field. Especially when playing one-on-one. For groups I just dont keep a score for myself, but to do one-on-one, I kinda gotta keep score or it defeats the challenge. Any ideas?????

Lorikeet · Post by **Lorikeet** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 4:18 pm

Why don't you figure how much you would win by and start off your opponent with that many points? For example, you could have 0 and your opponent could start with 200. That's a handicap

t.d. · Post by **t.d.** » Tue Feb 08, 2005 12:57 am

Not a bad idea. I think Iwill give that a shot. I was also considering having the opponent draw 8 tiles instead of 7 and me draw 6. I will try them both out and let you know what works.

yada · Post by **yada** » Wed Feb 09, 2005 1:07 am

one player plays until they get so and so points and the weaker player plays until they get so and so points

or

just don't count the double, triple letter and word squares for yourself

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Tue Feb 15, 2005 8:29 pm

Could you do Japanese words while they do English? The Japanese in Romanji of course. Have you tried Upwords? It allows big scores for very simple words. How about teams against you instead of one on one? Or changing the goal to filling all the spaces possible on the board or using up as many tiles as possible by the end of the game? You could get another game board and take the vowels and 's' tiles to make it easier for the original game or buy more tiles or make them. You can only use the originals but they can have a bag of vowels to enhance their tiles.

woodcutter · Post by **woodcutter** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 4:17 am

All good ideas, apart from getting them to play against you in a team! I think that will result in you winning, and looking like a proper big-head too!

t.d. · Post by **t.d.** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 6:11 am

Woodcutter, Im not trying to outdo them. Hell if we played a Japanese version they would surely kick my butt in the game. I need to stay in it just so they dont only use words consisting of 4 letters. I am playing it with individuals with pretty advanced English.

woodcutter · Post by **woodcutter** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 8:59 am

I usually stay in the game too, so that I can open out new spaces when the board gets congested. I simply don't keep score for myself. If I didn't do it, then the students would often soon be reduced to making only 2 letter words. Four letters are fine!

And the word they always try and make is bleedin' "E.T", which is a dilemma!

Sally Olsen · Post by **Sally Olsen** » Fri Feb 18, 2005 8:42 pm

How about having a list of little words that are unusual that they have looked up in the dictionary and understand from translation beside the board. At least that will give them some new ideas for their two letters or three. There is a Scrabble dictionary that you could allow them to use during play. Then you will learn some new words too and have fun trying to explain them. If you allow extra vowel tiles you could also make a theme for the scrabble game like food or sports.

Senorita Daniels · Post by **Senorita Daniels** » Mon Mar 07, 2005 6:09 pm

I've played Scrabble with two fourth graders, and I help them with words. They can gain more points that way, and possibly learn new words. I also had a dictionary on hand for challenges. If the word is not in the dictionary, it can't be used. If you had a pocket dictionary along, you wouldn't be able to use as many of the words that you know.

paulaya · Post by **paulaya** » Sat Mar 19, 2005 11:53 pm

Can you explain what scrabble is, please?

Lorikeet · Post by **Lorikeet** » Sun Mar 20, 2005 2:51 am

It's a board game, in which the players make words from different letters. See: http://www.scrabble.com/