Apples To Apples

[Jessica]

I have friends who love the game Apples to Apples (more info here). I have been batting around an idea for a way to make it work for my middle school students and would love some feedback from you all.

The basic idea of the game is that there is a given adjective (Awesome, for example) and a each player puts face down a card with a noun of some sort (candy, vacation, boys...) The cards are shuffled for anonymity. The person who pulled the adjective is the judge for that round and decides who played the best noun for that quality, and the players can argue for why a certain card should be selected over the others. There is a description on the web site that shows how it is done - I'm feeling like my description isn't the greatest right now.

Tomorrow I'm going to test this with my supplemental class, but I would love to get your input. Maybe ways to adapt for adults, ways to make it work for lower-level middle school students, things like that. I've included a bunch of  winter words I introduced this week (the borrowed from BogglesWorld lesson coming soon) and may try to make something less season-specific.

I used an excel document to create this, and so while I pasted the tables into word in order to upload, I didn't fix the formatting. If you want the nice neat version that prints out fairly well, let me know and I'll email it to you.

ETA: I tested this with my supplemental class (mixed grades/ability levels) and they LOVED it. I'm not sure how it would work in a bigger group, but I plan to use this for review with my adults, and the kids thought their peers would be able to play with students as the judges, too.

[AlexMokpo]

This sounds great!  I'm gonna try it on Monday!

[Brian]

I'm thinking about doing something like this for my winter camp.  I've got an activity that is similar, but can be played as a whole class.  But I want to try the card game at the end just for fun. 

A few questions for those who have tried it . . .

What levels did you use it for?   I agree that it'd be good for MS and HS, but maybe too tough for elementary school.   

How long did you play for?  If I decide to use it, it'd be as a filler activity at the end of class, so I'm thinking 10 - 20 minutes.  But, if it takes a while to explain, I might budget a little more time for it.   

Did the students enjoy it?   I see that Jessica's students liked it . . . anyone else?  I'm just a little nervous that it might not click with them (so of course I won't try it with students I don't think can handle it)

Did the students argue their cases?   I've never played this game, and I hadn't even heard of it until a few weeks ago . . . but I guess part of the fun is trying to argue why your selection ought to win.   Did students do that? 

Now, since I am a little confused by the directions . . .

What is a round?  Everybody gets five cards, so is a round when all the cards everybody has are played?  Or do you change judges after every green card?  After the round do the played cards get reshuffled and passed out again?  I know it can be up to me, but just curious how people do it.

What about the synonyms on the green cards?  The cards you attached don't have them, Jessica, but the ones shown on the website you gave did.  Do they serve any purpose in the game, or are they just for fun? 

Okay, thanks for reading.  I'm glad I have another few weeks to figure this game out. 

[AlexMokpo]

I think a game like this is worth a full period.  Afterall, it's using a maximum of their English abilites (you noted it would be difficult) in vocab (remember, they may not necessarily know all the words...even if you make it yourself with words you expect them to know) association, and verbal reasoning.  Each round will take at least two mins.
-Yes, they should verbally argue their choice.  I use the word "Argue", also, because I encouraged the not-chosen to complain and say theirs was best.  (Note: I'm not a miracle-teacher, I played this with miracle-students.  Only 6, all best of the best)

if you don't know the rules exactly - make them up.  The students won't know the difference as long as it's coherant ^_~

They won't get bored.  In my time here, I've had great success with many popular board games from Canada/USA...
-Pictionary
-Charades
-Scrabble (my grade 11's DIE for this game.  We play it almost every supplementary class for the full hour.)
-Balderdash (very advanced.  Even difficult for my grade 11's who can beat me at scrabble)
-Catch Phrase

If it's a game you'd play with friends for an hour, why not play with students for the full hour.  It's relevant to learning and they'll have some fun for once in their pathetic Korean-teenage lives.

[eggplant_tyrant]

http://www.nutsybolts.com

It's probably a bit too difficult and pop-culture oriented for anything but high-level high school students or adult learners, but for those of you who are stuck deskwarming, it could be a stimulating way to pass the time.

[ac3824a]

Here's the apples to apples template filled out with grade school levels.    I've added pictures as well, the only downside is that when you print them out- no square border shows up.

[negacoca]

Thank-you ac3824a!!!
I was looking in to buying apples to apples junior, but wasn't sure how to do it in Korea.  This is perfect for game day Friday for my advanced class!

[CellarDoor]

I'm going to look over this in more detail later, but so far it looks great!  As I opened some of the files, I saw your Korean additions and the cards look great!  I'm not sure yet how I'll use these cards since my classes are all about 40 students, but maybe I can try to play it during lunch or in camps with students as has been suggested elsewhere.

Personally, I found it a little daunting to try to access all 30+ individual files, and by the download numbers, others may have had the same experience.  It's too bad since the cards and words you posted seem so high quality.  So here's the compiled collection in two files.  I had a deskwarming day, so...   I can take no credit for anything except turning my boredom into something I hope was productive for our collective benefit.  Oh, and I changed the borders from a dotted line in the original to a solid line border.  Haven't tried printing it yet to see the effect though.

(big thanks to the mod who combined the topic threads!)

[peasgoodnonsuch]

This looks great! I'll keep it in the stash for random game days with my advanced/intermediate kiddies.

Side note: OP I just love that you put Arashi on there! I'm not sure how well they're known by my students, but they were the first Asian boy band I ever loved! 

[dbtm]

Thanks for all your hard work guys.

Which cards are supposed to be the "Green" cards in the game?

[solaris326]

I've used this game with my middle school students, in Advanced and Intermediate A classes, and they enjoy it.  I had my co-teacher translate the adjectives for the kids, so before we start playing, I hand out the complete list of adjectives to each kid.

[CellarDoor]

The nouns (person/place/thing) are the red card equivalents, and the adjectives would be the green cards if they had color.

I'm considering trying to get an Apples to Apples set (based on these files) laminated at my school.  Does anyone else do this with your game supplies and/or things that take a long time to cut out (and thus, replace if they get lost or destroyed?).  I think they might last longer that way... It may be 32 pages, but as long as the office secretary has enough lamination sheets in her drawer she might let me!

Too bad I don't really have the supplies or time to actually put a few strokes of red/green color on these myself with a pencil, pastel, or highlighter.  Even colored paper would be nice... hm.  It's a hassle to get color printing, since I have to send the file down to some office somewhere and they print and bring the color prints to my office.  Haha, am I putting too much energy and thought into this?   

[yitzike]

@pinklunchboxgirl @cellardoor

super grateful you created/consolidated/posted this. I bought the boxed version of A2A Jr and haven't actually tried it yet with my MS Convo Class because some other teachers I know said it was too difficult even for their Top A students, and mine are pretty low level. The biggest problem is of course the cultural references.

I think I'm going to buy a handful of laminate sheets myself on my next deskwarming day. I hope they're not too expensive! I can't wait to try this with my students.

[sugalumps]

I was thinking about using Apples to Apples too -- I love the game so much (it's a staple at game night) and thought it might be a fun way for students to learn vocabulary. My only concern was that I might have to augment/edit the decks to remove Western cultural references.

Thanks for this!

[popeye2u]

There is the red box and green box.  The red box is for lower level students.  There were a lot of  words such as Fur, gummi bears, macaroni and cheese that were hard.  I usually separated the hard ones.  I spent one class devoted to students writing in pencil the meanings in Korean so they wouldn't ask me repeatedly what a word means.  I did the same for the green box.  After a few times playing it, they begin remembering the korean and english meanings.

[duchessrachel]

I played this game with my after school class. I made this PPT to explain how to play the game to the students, so I thought I'd share. Hope it's helpful!

[seligamon22]

Does anyone know where you can buy good board games in Korea for a good price? Apples to Apples, Scrabble etc are all about 45,000W or more in my local English Book shop.

[thankQ]

I loved playing this game when I was younger so this is great! Thank you! I think they'll love it! ^^

[noles1970]

Does anyone know where you can buy good board games in Korea for a good price? Apples to Apples, Scrabble etc are all about 45,000W or more in my local English Book shop.

Here you go
http://www.koreaboardgames.com/

[Rootleaf]

Awesome, I enjoy this game and was looking for a way to incorporate it into a lesson.  My students are lower mid-level so I may try to go for the Junior edition. Actually, I quite like the idea of incorporating Korean actors and stars. Definitely would set aside a full period for this one though.