Similo History
Similo History is a cooperative deduction game with cards. One player gives clues to the others to help them guess which historical person on the board is the selected card. It has historical characters from ancient Egypt to Marie Curie. It is a short game and can add a touch of overall history.
Cardline Animals
Cardline is another small, quick card game. In this one, you each have a hand of animals and you are trying to place them in order in the center of the table. You can order them by height, weight, or lifespan. It is a versatile game and we play it with our 3 and 12 year old often because they both love it.
Kingdom Builder
This is a game about building your kingdom. You are placing settlements in the terrain type your card shows. The goal is to build near castles and accomplish various goals that change each game. The game is simple enough for younger kids and can be modified easily if needed. It has been a hit with everyone I have played it with from small children to elderly seniors.
The Quest for El Dorado
El Dorado is a deck building game. Each person has their own deck of cards that they play through and add to. The cards allow players to traverse the map of the jungle in a race to find the lost city of gold. This one is simple but with great depth.
Imhotep Duel
This game uses a tic-tac-toe type placement to acquire pieces to build monuments and pyramids. It is very easy to pick up and works well with any level of gaming experience. This one is for 2 players and is actually on our "to buy" list. We played it at our local game store and just love it!
Word on the Street Jr.
This is a team word game. Each team will get a topic and need to come up with a word to go with it. The letters in their word will move toward them till they get far enough to be claimed. It is like a letter tug of war. The jr. edition includes all of the letters, which will help early readers and spellers. You can also make your own topic cards based on what you are currently learning.
Carcassonne
This is a board game classic! The players place a tile each turn to build medieval cities, paths, cloisters, and farm land. At the end of the game, the table looks like an old map. It looks different every time. This was our first modern board game and it is still in our collection.
Planet
Planet is a very light game of planet construction. Each person has a 3 dimensional planet that they add terrain tiles to. The goal is to gain animals for their planet based on what terrain they like.
So, those are our 8 games. We are planning on sharing picks for other years of Sonlight curriculum as well. Is there a curriculum that you would like us to give suggestions for? Let us know in the comments below. You could also keep the conversation going by sharing some of the games you have used with Sonlight k-2. Our list is by no means exhaustive after all!
2 comments:
I used games last year with my grade 7 class. I found good ones for grade 7 history were 1754: French Indian War and 1812: Invasion of Canada both by Academy Games. They quite enjoyed it and it reinforced ideas and locations we’d talked about in class. They also got a better sense of the different types of games that are available.
I wrote about it on my own blog here: https://bsgames.ca/playing-games-in-class/
Very cool! We haven't played any Academy Games yet, but we are waiting for our copy of One Small Step to arrive.
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