Classroom Games for Teenagers

Man in black crew neck t-shirt standing beside woman in gray t-shirt.jpg

The classroom can sometimes become monotonous for teenage students. Integrating fun classroom activities for teenagers can help solve the issue of boring moments. In addition to subject fatigue, the many distractions of teenage life can also cause their attention to drift. Teachers may reach the end of a educational unit and not feel confident that students understand or have retention of the covered material. Teachers looking for engaging material review options or ways to break up classroom monotony to recapture their students' attention can try integrating games to compliment the curriculum.

1 Vocabulary Race

Integrating vocabulary race classroom games for teenagers helps students recall items learned during a vocabulary unit with many terms to recall. Teachers start by separating the classroom into teams and lining them up in front of the whiteboard. Students on each team must alternate in writing and defining a vocabulary word with each of the alphabet. The team that covers all of the letters of the alphabet first wins. Depending on the subject matter, you may wish to omit difficult letters such as "Q." This game can alleviate the problems caused by teens' short attention spans by encouraging their competitive spirits.

2 Tic-Tac-Toe Quiz

Another educational activities for teens option is to create a Tic-Tac-Toe Quiz. Teachers can create the "board" by placing nine desks in a three-by-three grid or simply drawing a tic-tac-toe layout on the whiteboard. After splitting the classroom into two teams, the teacher then writes several questions relating to the current unit on slips of paper for students to draw at random. If a team answers their question correctly, they can sit at one of the nine desks or write an "X" or "O" on the white board. If a team answers a question incorrectly, they lose the turn. This game works well for teens because teachers can control the difficulty of the questions asked to ensure the students demonstrate a high level of understanding. Giving out small prizes at the end of the game adds a reward element that may motivate students.

3 Team Sudoku

While Sudoku requires little math skills, playing it as an educational game for teenagers is a excellent way to give math students a day off after testing while still keeping math on the plan. In Sudoku, players have a nine-by-nine board divided into nine three-by-three sections with a goal of adding the digits 1-9 to each square on the board with no digit repeats in any horizontal line, vertical line or three-by-three section. Teachers can use a prepared Sudoku puzzle with solutions or create their own related puzzle. Options including giving the entire class the same puzzle or offering leveled puzzles for individual or group solving.

4 Educational Activities for Teens

English learning games for high school students can be as simple as writing a long sentence with the student objective of writing a new word from the sentence letters. Specify that each letter can only be used once with teams unable to repeat a word. Offer bonus points if students can create and define a word related to the current unit with the game continuing until there are no more letters or words to be made. Teenagers gain more lateral high level thinking with this vocabulary word game. Difficulty can be added by requiring each new word to include higher amounts of letters.

Aramenta Waithe has been a professional writer and ghostwriter since 1989. Her work has appeared in Florida's "Sun-Sentinel" and the "Miami Herald." She writes about a variety of subjects from home improvement to medicine. Waithe attended the University of Massachusetts and Florida Atlantic University, majoring in oceanographic engineering.

×