Zap It! A Learning Game for Kids

Need a really fun game to teach a variety of learning skills including letters, reading, math facts, vocab and more? Then “Zap It!” is the game for you. Today was the last day of school, but it doesn’t need to mean the last day of learning. Summer is such a great time to practice school in fun, creative spurts. So much can be lost throughout the summer if we just let learning slide. I’d encourage you to find small ways each day to bring a fun learning activity into your lives. You don’t need to come up with something new every day. You will find your favorites. I have a feeling this game I’m giving you today will quickly become a favorite. I think you would also find my posts about reading games and letter games helpful. There are a few wonderful things about this activity. First, it’s quick. You could play a round in five minutes and be done. However, you may find that your kids enjoy it so much they want to just keep on playing, like my kids did today. Secondly, it’s a game that is adaptable to a variety of school subjects. Today, we were working on site words. If I were focusing on Kenzie, I could do letters, sounds or simple CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words. With older kids, you could work on vocabulary – either a foreign language or working on definitions. You could also work on math facts for addition, subtraction, multiplication or division. I’m sure you can think of a variety of other ways to do this activity too.

The game is simple. Set your timer for a given amount of time. I found that 5 minutes worked well. Everyone takes a turn, trying to move as quick as they can. The goal is to collect as many popsicle sticks as you can. Pull a stick and read the word, solve the problem, give a definition…whatever route you have decided to go. If you get it right, you keep the stick. Then, it’s the next person’s turn. You keep going around and collecting sticks. The big game changer is the “Zap It!” stick. If you pull the “Zap It!” stick, you must put all of your sticks back in the cup. Keep playing until the timer goes off. After the timer goes off, whoever has the most sticks, wins. It is fast paced. It can be a quick if you only want to do a couple rounds. It is fun. It is a great learning opportunity. Sounds like a winner to me.

I was just going to play with Abby since we were doing sight words, but Kenzie really wanted to play too. So, we had Abby whisper the word to Kenzie too. There is no reason why Kenzie can’t start to memorize sight words as well. Actually, a great IPhone app for that Eggywords. I learned about the app from Jenae at I Can Teach my Child. All my kids have been playing it. The girls just tell Corban what eggs to hit. He sometimes listens to them and at other times like to watch the eggs just splat.

I wish “Zap It!” were my own invention. Like I said, it was the last day of school today. My friend and neighbor was unloading her car of school stuff because she is a teacher. We were chatting, and she was asking me if I wanted a some things from her class – like candy and stickers. I saw this cup of Popsicle sticks sticking up out of her bag and just had to ask about it. I asked to borrow it, and there we had our activity for the day.