The Day Before Spring Break: Experimentation Day

The week before spring break can be tough. Kids are ready and excited, which finds them not making the best choices. There is a lot to wrap up and square away, because as soon as we get back, it is business time. The countdown to standardized testing will be on. This year, we finished a unit on Thursday, so we had a Friday to relax a bit. I love days like this. I call them experimentation days. I get to try some crazy idea with my students. 

For this experiment, we played a review game that I have been toying with for a while called Tumbling Towers. Like all good games there is story to set it up.

"You are a member of an island tribe. Your people are constantly warring with the surrounding islands to prove who is the best. Now to demonstrate your superiority, you have begun construction of a tower to give other islands no choice but to look up to you . However, as you begin to build, you notice the other islands have the same idea. You will not stand for this! Luckily, these islands also have an endless supply of boulders. When the time is right, you will unleash them on your unsuspecting neighbors. Get ready to watch the Tumbling Towers!"

The main rules of the game

• Your group works out a problem on the board and come to a consensus. (We played with white boards.)
• If your team is correct, you roll a RED and GREEN dice. The Green is the number of one inch wooden cubes your team gets to use to build a tower. The Red is the number of stripes of paper your team gets to build boulders to throw at other island's towers. All strips of paper could be used individually or wrapped together to make larger boulders. (I used recycled paper in fourths.)
• Teams have to use the blocks to build the towers inside of a square of tape on their tables. (Pictured below) 
• If the tower falls, students may reuse any block that does not fall outside the tape.  Fallen blocks outside the tape are lost.
• The goal is to build the tallest tower of all without having it knocked down by other teams boulders.

Bumping rules

• If you bump your own table and your tower falls, all rules apply. So be careful.
• If you bump someone else's table. They get to rebuild and you will be removed from the activity. Sabotage will not be tolerated. You may not leave your island.

  All power ups were usable. I even offered a set this week that worked well for the game.

For the game I set up our tables like so.

This added a nice feel to the class. It increased the island theme and the students knew something was up the second they walked in the door. To throw boulders, students had to stand at the end of the table. This added an element of strategy. The easy shot was the table next to you, but you have to beware revenge. It also added excitement for the team brave enough to take a shot all the way across the void. 

The game was immediately understandable to my students and was a huge hit. They had a blast strategizing their moves, deciding how big to make their boulders, and when to build up or expand the base. Depending on the class, we got 8 to 10 questions in during the game, this including modeling and corrections if students forgot an older topic. Work was not rushed because correct answers mattered. These experimental days can sometimes be things that I never return to. Tumbling Towers will be back, and likely sooner than later.