It is difficult for children to move from one subject to another without a mini break in between. I have been trying a few different transition activities over the last few months and here are some of my favourites.
Buzz Off
This is an all time favourite with my class that my TP student used. This focusses on spellings. The children all stand up and I give them a spelling – each child says one letter of the word and at the end of the word the next child says ‘Buzz’, the next says ‘Off’ and the next child sits down. I love this game because it isn’t always the best speller that wins – there is an element of luck too.
If a child gets a letter wrong they are out. The word or previous letters can’t be repeated so the children have to listen really carefully.
Example: Word; Octopus
O – C – T – O – P – U – S – Buzz – Off (Next child is out)
Tables Games
I’ve played this in lots of different ways.
- Everyone stands up – if they get their table right they sit down. (Good way to revise quickly)
- Everyone stands up, two children are called and a question is given, first to answer stays standing and the other child sits down. (Tables champion)
- Tables boards – I love these from ABC School Supplies, available here.
Boggle
An all time favourite in my room! Different letters are displayed and the children try to make as many words they can in the time allocated.
Countdown
This countdown game is brilliant to get children to use different operations in maths. They are given a target number and a list of other numbers that they can use to reach the target. (You can access the game here)
We also use ‘Whats the question’ which is quite similar. Target numbers are displayed and the children have to use as many operations as they can to write a sum to reach the target number.
Go Noodle
An all time favourite for many classes. I find they can be a bit hit/miss with senior classes though.
Here are two of our favourites;
Describe the nouns
This is a game that a friend shared with me the other day. Basically, the children all get a piece of paper and write down the name of a person (must be someone that most people in the class would know – could be a classmate/singer/sportsperson etc.) place (must be a county/country/landmark), thing (must be something you can touch/pick up) and an animal.
Each slip of paper is collected and put in a box. The children are then put into teams. Each team selects one player to be the describer and they have 40 seconds to describe each noun on the list (their teammates try to guess the answers). If they get all the answers then the team earns a point (I use class dojo) and if they don’t get everything then it moves onto the next team. This is a great game for oral language!
Math Vocabulary
This is a game that a colleague shared recently. The children use the maths vocabulary found at the back of their maths books (We use Planet Maths and there is a full list). They give one of their team members a word and then they describe/define that word. Great way to get children practising using maths vocabulary and checks understanding too!