After you have made your game choices, you can click on the “start” button to begin your game.  The premise behind the game is a simple one - - the letters of your mystery word have been scrambled, and you must put them back into order. 

You are reminded which category you are playing with at the top of the screen.  In the example above, for instance, we are doing a medium level game about energy terms.  If we had chosen the “timer” setting, we would also see a countdown icon at the top right hand corner of the screen:

To unscramble the letters given, you simply drag them to the correct boxes in the correct order, and then click “solve”. If you are correct, you will receive a congratulatory screen.

If you aren’t correct, or if you run out of time before you can correctly solve the puzzle, the game will tell you the correct word, and then you may click on the “back” button to play again.

To try Unscramble, or any of the other fun and educational vocabulary building games at the site, head over to Vocabulary.co.il!

When you first click on the Match Game icon, it will take you to the mode choice screen:

If you choose “LEARN” mode, then you will be presented with a choice of topics, such as Animals, Human Body, Colors, Games, etc. Once you have chosen your topic, a screen of flashcards will load.  To learn the words on the cards, just click on each one to hear it spoken.  You can also adjust the volume using the icon at the bottom of the game screen.

If you want to try out the “PLAY” mode, just go back to the Mode Screen and click on PLAY.  Again, you will have your choice of categories.  but you will also get to choose whether to play in EASY, MEDIUM, or HARD level.  The easiest level only uses 12 cards while the hardest level challenges you with 24! 

Once you click “START”, then the game begins. Now, you have begun an interactive version of the popular Concentration-style card game, where you click to turn over the cards to make matches of like words and images. 

Incorrect guesses are prompted by a buzzer sound, while correct guesses keep the vocabulary cards matched and face-up on the screen.  When the player has correctly matched all the cards in the round, the game is over and the number of clicks it took you to succeed will be revealed.  

Match Game is a wonderful game for practicing sight words in several different categories.  It is recommended for students in grades K-2 or for ESL students. 

The Quiz is a simple question and multiple-choice answer game with a timer to increase the challenge.  When you first click on the Quiz game, this is the screen you will see first:

As you can see, you have a choice of quiz topics, a choice of difficulty levels, length of game time, and how many questions to answer in that time period.  You can also choose whether to include sound with the quiz or not by clicking on the audio button at the bottom of the screen.

Once you have made all your choices, and clicked on the “CONTINUE” button, you will be taken to the loading screen, which will confirm all your choices, and give you the option to go ahead and start your quiz. 

If you change your mind about any of these options, you can simply hit the “Quit” button at the bottom of the screen to be taken back to the options.

Once you click on “Start Quiz” get ready to play, because your timer begins immediately.  All you have to do is read the question and decide which vocabulary word will best fill in the blank.  You will have the amount of time you set in the options to choose your best answer.  Correct answers will show up in green.  Incorrect answers will show up in red, with the correct answer highlighted in green. 

Once you have completed ALL the questions, you will then receive your score, which you can even print out if you wish!  You can also choose to play another game from this screen.

Because it uses a fill-in-the-blank style of question and answer, the Vocabulary Quiz game is an excellent preparation tool for standardized tests.  Teachers and students alike appreciate the simplicity of the game, but also the interactivity it provides.  If you dropped by Vocabulary.co.il recently, be sure to stop in this week and play The Vocabulary Quiz or any of our other terrific vocabulary games and activities!

Hangman, as with most games, now has “high-tech” alternatives, such as the fun game on Vocabulary.co.il called “Hang Mouse.”  Let’s look closer this week at Hang Mouse and just why this is still the perfect game for rainy day fun!

When you first click on the Hang Mouse game within the site, this is the screen that comes up:

Hang Mouse has a much more simple interface that some of the other games on the site, because all it requires of you is to simply scroll through the available topics, and choose one.  Then you click OK to play.

Once you have picked your category, your first puzzle will appear  - - along with a mouse, a cat, and plate of cheese.  The object of the game is to choose letters from the alphabet list that will complete the mystery word in your chosen topic. With each correct guess, the mouse safely retrieves a piece of cheese from the plate without disturbing the cat. 

Wrong guesses, however, slowly begin to waken the cat from his sound slumber, and put the mouse at higher and higher risk of getting caught.

The number of remaining guesses before getting caught will always be posted underneath the cat, as you can see in the picture above.

But correctly guessing the mystery word will result in a nice little congratulatory tune, a “You Win”, and a chance to click the “Back” button to play again.

Too many errors, on the other hand, will bring a premature end to our little mouse friend, will show you the solved puzzle, and will offer you a chance to try again for a better outcome next time.

If you would like to try Hang Mouse, or any of the other fun and educational vocabulary building games at the site, head over to Vocabulary.co.il! 

Well, just as with most word games, the Word Search puzzle has gone “high-tech” and is now available to play online in many different formats.  The Word Search game at Vocabulary.co.il. has some of its own unique attributes, so I thought it might be fun to explore those in a little more detail for this post.

When you first click on the Word Search game within the site, this is the screen that comes up:

You will notice that you have a few options at the top before beginning game play.  You can choose a level - - either easy or hard, the length of your game - - either short, regular, or long, and whether or not to use the game timer. 

Then, below your game options are your category options for vocabulary.  If you are studying a particular theme in your classroom, if you are looking for grade-level vocabulary, or if you just have a particular subject you are interested in, you can choose that category to use for game play.  To see a complete list of game categories available, click here.

Once you have chosen your category, you will click on the play button to have the words shuffled and added to your game grid.

You can also use the menu at the bottom of your game grid screen to either go back to the previous page, solve the puzzle, print out the puzzle for solving offline, changing the font size of the puzzle, or turning the game audio on or off.

To play the game, you simply search the grid for words in the word list.  They may be listed either horizontally, vertically, forwards, backwards, or even diagonally!  Once you have located a word to solve, click on the first letter of the word with your cursor and drag the cursor over each of the other letters in the word to select it.  The word will then be highlighted as “found,” on both the grid and the word list.

Once you have completed the entire puzzle, or clicked the “solve” button to have it solved for you, you can click the “back” button to return to the main game screen to choose another puzzle.

For more ideas about using word search puzzles in your home, classroom, or homeschool, check out these posts:

• Grade Level Vocabulary Games
• Vocabulary Games for Homeschoolers
• Self-Study for ESL Vocabulary
• Those Wonderful Word Searches

If you have been wondering how to play the Cross Words game on Vocabulary.co.il, then here’s an overview:

Once you are on the main game page, you will click on “Cross Words” from the top column listing.

At that point, the game will take you to the options page, where you can choose your vocabulary topic, and your difficulty level.  Then, you will click on START to begin the game.

When the game opens, you will see your puzzle screen load, and a list of menu choices to the right of the screen.  Each of the menu options is designed to help you accomplish what you want to within the game.

• check: holding down the check button will identify incorrect words
• hint: deducts points from your score, but allows you to reveal unsolved letters in the puzzle
• solve: for when you simply have to give up and want to see the solved puzzle
• floating window: turns the floating window on or off
• new: allows you to begin a new puzzle
• print: allows you to print your puzzle for solving offline
• help: reminds you of the rules of play

To play, you simply move your cursor across the screen to see the hints for each empty set of word boxes.  By click on the first letter of the box and beginning to type the word, you can complete your word choice.  Then you complete the puzzle, word by word through all 12 choices.  If you aren’t able to solve a particular word, you can ask for a hint to receive a letter clue, although it will lower your game score.  And, of course, you can click “Solve” to reveal any words you weren’t able to figure out on your own.

Cross Words is a fun and interactive way to practice vocabulary at any level of English learning.  Stop by Vocabulary.co.il and practice your crossword puzzle strategy today!

So what is it about the computer that makes a quiz so much more bearable? If you’ve spent any time on Facebook at all, you know that most of us are willing to take just about any quiz you throw at us as long as it is digital!  What kind of romantic are you? How much trivia do you know from your favorite TV show? There is something about simply pointing and clicking that makes an online quiz seem more like play than effort. And when you get the final results from your responses, it doesn’t seem to matter whether you did well or not, because it wasn’t some overbearing teacher grading you. No, it was your non-judgmental computer!

Teachers have known about this computer-bias for quiz taking for some time, and they have used it to their advantage. Many teachers upload all of their class quizzes and tests to the net, so that students can feel more relaxed and engaged as they attempt to show what they know. And it works!

This non-stressful quiz strategy is the idea behind the vocabulary quiz game on www.vocabulary.co.il . With two skill levels, two timer settings, and 16 fun topics to choose from, students and non-students alike will find themselves actually having fun testing their vocabulary knowledge. Whether you are practicing vocabulary for school, speech therapy, or English as a Second Language, why not have fun doing it? Try our vocabulary quiz game or one of the eleven other enjoyable vocabulary games on our site today.

• Civil Rights
• Martin Luther King, Jr.
• Rosa Parks
• African American History
• I Have a Dream
• Civil Rights Movement

And, of course, as always on SpellingCity, you can also create your own lists, based on a specific book, unit, or subject you are studying.  Then your students can practice those words, play games with them, and even use them as printable handwriting worksheets.  This is a wonderful way to extend a study on Martin Luther King Jr. in celebration of this National Holiday and improve your student social studies vocabulary and spelling.

Have you signed up for a premium membership at SpellingCity.com yet?  With automatic test grading, a student grade book, complete activity tracking for each student, telephone support, and access to premium games, a premium membership is definitely a MUST for frequent users of the site.  Click here to find out more.

For these children, it is even more important to receive focused and individualized vocabulary instruction designed with their strengths and weaknesses in mind.  A multisensory approach to vocabulary learning, for example, is often helpful.  By using word activities that involve touch, sound, and sight, children with learning weaknesses in one mode can compensate with their strengths in others.

Children with reading differences also usually benefit from a dual approach of both phonetic and sight word instruction in vocabulary.  This combination focus on both the visual and auditory aspects of language can help cement new words and word meanings for those with dyslexia.

Other ideas for helping students with dyslexia improve their vocabulary:

• previewing new vocabulary in a book passage before having them read the passage.
• be sure to interject unfamiliar or unknown words into everyday conversations with them
• teaching them how to use online dictionaries and thesauruses - - especially those with auditory support
• encouraging them to play word games both off and online, such as the ones at Vocabulary.co.il

Image by hebedesign via Flickr

If English happens to be your second language, you may have a very special New Years resolution this year: building your English vocabulary. 

If that sounds like a resolution that might be too difficult to keep, then check out the following simple tips for making English vocabulary learning fun and interesting.

1) Join a social network for others wanting to practice their English.  Sites like EnglishForums allow new English speakers to create a profile and interact with many other people from around the world who want to practice their language skills and make new friends.

2) Have an English movie marathon…call together some of your ESL buddies and pick out your favorite movies, or movies you have all been wanting to see, and then watch them…completely in English…and completely with English subtitles.  See how much dialogue you can catch as it whizzes by on the screen!

3) Hold an English karaoke contest.  Send out invitations to people that you know are all trying to learn English and set up a one-night English Karaoke competition.  Remember - - all songs sung MUST be completely in English!!

4) Spend a little time each day playing the fun games at Vocabulary.co.il. Just 10-15 minutes a day of game-playing at the Vocabulary.co.il website will quickly start to make a difference on your English vocabulary knowledge.  The games are fun, and can be played from any computer with an internet connection, so you can fit your practice into even a few minutes at the coffee shop!

You can probably discover many other fun and easy ways to practice your English vocabulary, too.  Setting a New Year’s resolution doesn’t have to be boring or time-consuming. 

Happy New Year from those of us at Vocabulary.co.il!!