Playing Name Bingo with Chrysanthemum

Overview

Featured Resources

From Theory to Practice

 

OVERVIEW

This get-to-know-you activity gives every student a chance to be in the spotlight as they participate in the Name Bingo Game. After reading Chrysanthemum to introduce the topic of names, students make Name Bingo cards by writing the name of each classmate in a different square of a blank Bingo board. Next, students brainstorm personal questions designed to get to know one another. To play the game, the teacher randomly calls out a name, and students cover that name on their board with a marker. In this twist of the traditional bingo game, after each name is chosen, the student responds by answering one of the questions designed to help students learn more about one another. The game continues until someone gets Bingo. The winner then gets to add another question to the list before a new game begins.

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FEATURED RESOURCES

Blank Bingo Card: Students can write their classmates' names in the squares to create a card for Name Bingo.

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FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE

In Becoming Literate: The Construction of Inner Control, Marie Clay states, "Children will use their knowledge of letters in family names or classmates' names at later stages as part of their analysis of new words." This classroom activity focuses on the beginning of that process of analysis. Clay explains the reason that such activities engage learners: "A child's name has singular importance as he embarks on learning about literacy... It enhances his security and his self-image, giving him a feeling of importance...The use of the children's names in a class activity is a useful way of developing letter knowledge. "

Mariana Souto-Manning takes it a step further, emphasizing the importance of respecting students' names as part of a diverse classroom community. "By highlighting the importance of names and their many meanings and accents across cultures, languages, and places, we can create a space for acknowledging the identities children embody and move one step closer toward genuinely valuing diversity in classrooms."

Further Reading

Mariana Souto-Manning. "Honoring Children's Names and, Therefore, Their Identities." School Talk 12.3 (April 2007): 1-2.

 

Clay, M.M. (1991). Becoming literate: The construction of inner control. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

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