Spelling football

[Jodi]

This game is a big hit at our house; well, when they aren't fighting I drew a football field on our dry erase board. Then I made up cards with previous spelling words on it (a pile for each boy), along with the word used in a sentence. The boys get 6 tries to make a touchdown. Each spelled word gains them 10 yards and a first down. If the word is misspelled, it's a sack. We played this last week for spelling and they begged to play it again this week and for me to add more words to their piles. I think this will be a permanent spelling review game for us.

[ami]

Great job, Jodi!

[Tristan]

It sounds like they're having fun but I have to admit I'm clueless about football. How many lines are on the field? What does a first down mean?

[Cindi IA]

sounds fun! Great job being creative!

[Jodi]

It sounds like they're having fun but I have to admit I'm clueless about football. How many lines are on the field? What does a first down mean?

Start in the middle with the 50 yard line, then count 40, 30, 20, 10 and goal line on either side of the 50. Past the goal line on both sides is the endzone (I wrote Touchdown). First down in football is when you have moved the ball 10 yards. In our game, it means they spelled the word right and can move their paper football to the next yard line. A sack is if they spell it wrong and have to stay at that yard line. They have 6 tries to get to the endzone and make a touchdown. (You only need 5 if you spell every word correctly - so this gives them 1 wrong answer per touchdown attempt.)

There is also a golf spelling game I would like to try sometime, but maybe not until after football season is over. These 2 ideas came from Spelling Power.

[Clementine in IL]

Great idea, Jodi! Your post reminded me of a book I saw at Borders one time: http://www.amazon.com/Football-Math-Tou ... r=1-1#noop. I think there's also a baseball-related book by this publisher.