I Don't Think So - Review "Game"

I adapted this review from Miss Rudolf.

In a nutshell, the students do problems in a group and then give those problems to the next group to check their work.  Points are awarded a teams win.

One problem Miss Rudolf wrote about was grading every single problem, so I made a few changes in my version.  I created the problems instead of the students creating their own.  I know this takes a little of the learning away, but a plus side is that every type of problem that I want reviewed is covered.  I also did two rounds of the activity because I wanted the students to understand how the scoring worked (I'll get to that in a minute) and have another chance to earn as many points as possible.

Set up:

In one class I had 4 groups of students so I made two copies of the file, cut out the problems and gave teams 1 and 3 the A problems and teams 2 and 4 the B problems.

Timing:

I allowed the students about 20-25 minutes to work on the problems and then 15 minutes to check over another team's work.  

Scoring:

I did keep the basics of Miss Rudolf's scoring:  1 point for a correct answer and 2 points for finding an incorrect answer.  However, I did add the following.  

First, the team would receive 3 points for a set of problems.  I define a set of problems where each group member got a problem correct.  I did this for two reasons.  One is that I wanted the students to help each other with the problems rather than encourage one person to do all the work.  Second, I wanted to keep it fair to the groups who had less team members.  Although they may not get as many problems correct due to lack of people, they could make up for it by getting more sets.  

Second, the only way to receive the two points for finding an incorrect answer is to state what the person did that was incorrect.  

Winnings:

I didn't want any team to feel like they had lost.  I mean earning any points is a type of winning.  Currently we are playing "Survival of the Fittest" and I allowed the teams to purchase supplies with the points they earned.  

Pink Supply - cost 5 points

Yellow Supply - cost 8 points

Green Supply - cost 10 points

Next Time:

I'm thinking that I should award some points for accurately checking the other team's work.  I found that many students just check incorrect and put down some bogus reason in the hopes that they would receive the two points.  I'll have to experiment with this a little bit more.

Grading:

It wasn't that horrible.  No worse that grading tests or homework assignments, especially with the answer key handy.

What I like about this review:

For the first round, students sorted through the problems and did the "easy" ones first.  But for the second round, they were forced to do the more challenging problems.

If teams wanted the most points they had to help each other even if it means to stop working on your problems and walk your teammate through his problem.  

Students realized how important it is to take notes.  I saw them borrowing notebooks from each other and wishing they had been more organized in the first place.

What I don't like about this review:

The grading, but who likes paperwork?