Tic Tac Booyah

I will start off by saying that this was NOT my original idea. A member of one of the fifth grade/upper elementary Facebook groups I'm in shared it with us, and many in the group had success with it!

I'm sure that there are many variations of it, but here is how I adapted it for my class.

Object of the Game
Students compete as teams to answer questions. When they answer a question correctly, they claim a square. Teams try to get as many three-in-a-row groupings as possible.

Set Up
I decided to make teams of 3 students. I wanted to do this for math, so I printed off multiple sets of fraction word problems so that there was one set per team. Task cards were perfect for this because the groups answer one question at a time. I quickly color-coded each set so that I knew which group got which questions. (This will make more sense later.) Finally, I cut apart the problems.

Since this was something that I felt like I would probably do again, I created a game board to be projected on my white board. You can get a copy of the Google Slide by clicking the image below. (NOTE: It isn't editable because the text and grid are pictures. If you want to change things, you'll have to delete the picture and add your own text boxes. Or cover up rows and columns with white boxes.)

Each team will also need something to write their answers on to bring to you, like a whiteboard or scratch paper.

How to Play
After dividing students into their teams of 3, I gave each team a question face-down. I gave Team 1 a question from the red stack, Team 2 from the orange stack, and so on. When I give the signal, all teams flip over the problem and work on solving it.

When they have a solution, one team member brings their question slip and answer and stands in line for me to check it. If they get it right, they get to mark a square with their team number. I give them a new problem from their color stack to solve. If they don't get it right, I give them the option to either take it back to their team to revise or trade it in for a new problem.

When a team gets three in a row, they circle their tic-tac-toe. After a predetermined amount of time, whoever has the most tic-tac-toes wins!

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