What can you do when your planned activity ends 15 minutes before your meeting ends? Do you need an activity to consolidate and review information covered by a sequence of related activities, or wrap up a season of Science Club meetings? Consider creating a quiz of relevant questions, preferably with a range of difficulty. Prepare one question per expected minute of game time.
Divide your students into teams; four members per team works well. Provide each team with slips of colored paper, at least one per question, and pencils. Each team gets a unique color. Obtain a noise maker such as a call bell or buzzer.
Present the first question. Each team determines an answer and writes it on a slip of paper. One team member brings the slip to the designated place.
When each team’s representative has arrived, ask them one-by-one to read their answers. When answers are correct, collect the slip and allow the student to ring the bell. Place correct slips in piles, one per team. If answers are incorrect set the slip aside; the student doesn’t ring the bell. Representatives return to their teams, ready to tackle the next question. Team members take turns bringing the slips and ringing the bell. When the last question has been answered, or you run out of time, count the correct slips to determine the winning team.
This format has advantages over other “beat the buzzer” or “spelling bee” games. Bold students have no advantage over timid ones, no student is put on the spot to answer correctly, and the number of students who get to ring the bell is maximized. You don’t need a separate score keeper and children enjoy the suspense of watching the piles of correct slips being counted.
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