<description>&lt;figure class="wp-block-post-featured-image"&gt;&lt;img data-recalc-dims="1" fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" width="800" height="519" src="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?resize=800%2C519&amp;#038;ssl=1" class="attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image" alt="" style="object-fit:cover;" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?w=800&amp;amp;ssl=1 800w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?resize=300%2C195&amp;amp;ssl=1 300w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?resize=768%2C498&amp;amp;ssl=1 768w" sizes="(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px" /&gt;&lt;/figure&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Listener request today! We&amp;#8217;re going to talk about ELA skills and board games to support them.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:00:00 Fact for 425&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;The most expensive film produced is &lt;em&gt;Avatar&lt;/em&gt; (USA, 2009), with an estimated production budget of &lt;strong&gt;$425 million&lt;/strong&gt;. &lt;em&gt;Avatar&lt;/em&gt; went on to achieve a worldwide box-office gross of $2.9 billion – the highest of all time.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;Sponsor Message&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;You can set up a totally free call by going to &lt;a href="https://firstmovefinancial.com/familygamers" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener sponsored nofollow"&gt;firstmovefinancial.com/familygamers&lt;/a&gt; today.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:03:30 What We&amp;#8217;ve Been Playing&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring &amp;#8211; Trick-Taking Game&lt;/em&gt; *&lt;br&gt;&lt;em&gt;Stew&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;em&gt;Cat Rescue&lt;/em&gt; *&lt;br&gt;&lt;em&gt;Trio&lt;/em&gt; (&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/trio/" type="post" id="40375"&gt;our review&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;br&gt;&lt;em&gt;boop&lt;/em&gt; (app version * &amp;#8211; &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/boop/" type="post" id="31228"&gt;we love &lt;em&gt;boop&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/a&gt;, not sure this is the best way to play it)&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;(*) first time mentioned on The Family Gamers Podcast&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:14:45 The Family Gamers Community&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/posts/4436330106656445" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;Welcome to our newest members!&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h3 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;#Backtalk&lt;/h3&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;We asked you about summer board gaming plans.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Read the answers on &lt;a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/posts/4425496841073105"&gt;Facebook&lt;/a&gt; or &lt;a href="https://discord.com/channels/1157003438425653379/1239323617368604672" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;#backtalk channel&lt;/a&gt; of the Discord.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:20:50 Patreon Shoutout&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Shouting out our Patreons! Check out the tiers at &lt;a href="https://thefamilygamers.com/patreon"&gt;thefamilygamers.com/patreon&lt;/a&gt;, and you can see our merch at &lt;a href="https://store.thefamilygamers.com/"&gt;store.thefamilygamers.com&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:22:00 ELA Learning in Board Games&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;There&amp;#8217;s lots of subjects that we can talk about when talking about learning through board games. There&amp;#8217;s the hard sciences, there&amp;#8217;s math, and then there&amp;#8217;s the more liberal arts side of education, which is important, but a lot more difficult to teach or work through with games.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;The best way to practice ELA is through just doing more reading and writing. But you can &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/reading-skills-boardgames/"&gt;support foundational skills&lt;/a&gt; through work with board games, and also inspire more practice for &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/gameschool-ela-math/" type="post" id="17704"&gt;older kids with &amp;#8220;gameschooling&amp;#8221;&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;We split the &amp;#8220;older kid&amp;#8221; skills into three groups, with games for each:&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h3 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/reading/"&gt;Reading&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/h3&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;You&amp;#8217;re looking for chunks of prose text (not a rule book, not just a few words of flavor text) that will force some practice. This is for fluency, simply encountering more text in more ways.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Tales of the Arabian Nights&lt;/em&gt; &amp;#8211; roll &amp;amp; move blended with adventure choices (read chunks of story)&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Look for sequential text &amp;#8211; that has a beginning, middle, and end. But doesn&amp;#8217;t have to be long! Games like &lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/her-story-board-game/" type="post" id="31173"&gt;HerStory&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; or &lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/trekking-through-history/" type="post" id="34091"&gt;Trekking through History&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; have a few sentences on each card.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Above and Below&lt;/em&gt; or other similar &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/red-raven-games/" type="post_tag" id="361"&gt;games from Red Raven&lt;/a&gt; will have you read chunks in the rulebook that are short stories. Choose a path after reading some dialogue and description!&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h3 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:32:30 Writing&lt;/h3&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Writing is a hard skill to build on in games. Penmanship can be improved through simple practice. But the harder skill to build is &amp;#8220;how to tell a story&amp;#8221; (creative writing).&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tall-tales/" type="post" id="26005"&gt;Tall Tales&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; has players physically WRITE DOWN a scene based on a prompt and restrictions. Then all the story ideas are read out loud. One is chosen to be the &amp;#8220;real&amp;#8221; story and the next round must build off that.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/untold/" type="post" id="3986"&gt;Untold: Adventures Await&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; is an RPG/storytelling game using Story Cubes. It provides a lot of scaffolding to assist. But you could do much of it with just the StoryCubes and a piece of paper.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/bear-in-mind/" type="post" id="58994"&gt;Bear in Mind&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; uses storytelling as an aid to memory!&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Of course, all &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/roleplaying/" type="post_tag" id="138"&gt;role-playing games&lt;/a&gt; can encourage improvement in creative story telling.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/classic-reviews-dixit/" type="post" id="2707"&gt;Dixit&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; is a story-telling game. Normally the storyteller is trying to match with just 1-2 players, not everyone. But you can change the rules around this!&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h3 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:39:00 &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/word-games/" type="post_tag" id="336"&gt;Spelling &amp;amp; Vocabulary&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/h3&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Talk about a tough skill to teach or practice! Most word games are pretty punishing for bad spelling. But there are a few that can be used for practice and improvement. (We did a &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/episode-346-room-to-grow-word-games/"&gt;Room to Grow on this topic&lt;/a&gt; a few years ago.)&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Bananagrams&lt;/em&gt; &amp;#8211; especially when using &lt;a href="https://boardgamesforallages.com/b-mod/bananagrams-b-mod/"&gt;B-mods for younger kids&lt;/a&gt;!&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/illiterati/" type="post" id="33717"&gt;Illiterati&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; &amp;#8211; which is a cooperative game: everyone can assist each other in making words or sharing letters. And the supervillain theme can give an extra little push for a kid on the fence about a word game.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Scattergories&lt;/em&gt; &amp;#8211; mostly for vocabulary (but also penmanship!)&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tapple/" type="post" id="21949"&gt;Tapple&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt; / &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tapple-10/" type="post" id="44589"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Tapple 10&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/a&gt;&amp;#8211; can pull in younger kids even if they&amp;#8217;re not competitive. &amp;#8220;What are other items in this category?&amp;#8221;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:43:00 Have you used games to help kids practice ELA skills?&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;What other games would you recommend?&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h2 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;0:45:00 New Backtalk Question&lt;/h2&gt; &lt;figure class="wp-block-image size-full"&gt;&lt;img data-recalc-dims="1" decoding="async" width="700" height="350" src="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Backtalk_treat_games.jpg?resize=700%2C350&amp;#038;ssl=1" alt="Backtalk: How do you treat your games?" class="wp-image-62437" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Backtalk_treat_games.jpg?w=700&amp;amp;ssl=1 700w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Backtalk_treat_games.jpg?resize=300%2C150&amp;amp;ssl=1 300w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" /&gt;&lt;/figure&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;When thinking about games that you play with your family, how do you treat them? What happens if a card gets bent, for example?&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Tell us &lt;a href="https://discord.com/channels/1157003438425653379/1239323617368604672" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;on the #backtalk channel&lt;/a&gt; on our Discord, or &lt;a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/posts/4438156919807097" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;in our Facebook community&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;h3 class="wp-block-heading"&gt;Find Us Online:&lt;/h3&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Facebook: &lt;a href="https://www.facebook.com/familygamersaa" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;@familygamersaa&lt;/a&gt; and &lt;a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;thefamilygamers.com/community&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;Twitter (X): &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/familygamersAA" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;@familygamersaa&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;Instagram: &lt;a href="https://www.instagram.com/familygamersaa/"&gt;@familygamersaa&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;TikTok: &lt;a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@familygamersaa/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;@familygamersaa&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;Bluesky: &lt;a href="https://bsky.app/profile/familygamersaa.bsky.social" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;@familygamersaa&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;Threads: &lt;a href="https://www.threads.com/@familygamersaa" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"&gt;@familygamersaa&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;Youtube: &lt;a href="https://www.youtube.com/TheFamilyGamers"&gt;TheFamilyGamers&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;or join the Family Tabletop Community on Discord! &lt;a href="https://thefamilygamers.com/discord"&gt;thefamilygamers.com/discord&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Or, for the most direct method, email us! andrew@thefamilygamers.com and anitra@thefamilygamers.com.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;PLEASE don&amp;#8217;t forget to subscribe to the show, tell your friends about the show, and leave us a review at &lt;a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-family-gamers-podcast/id1031290391"&gt;Apple Podcast&lt;/a&gt; or whatever your podcast subscription source is. We&amp;#8217;re also on Amazon Music, &lt;a href="https://tunein.com/podcasts/Kids--Family-Podcasts/The-Family-Gamers-Podcast-p1151589/"&gt;TuneIn&lt;/a&gt;, and &lt;a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/5T4hCWTyqdY2Io4fslCbOl"&gt;Spotify&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;You can also now find us on YouTube Music! So pull it up and give us a listen while you&amp;#8217;re toiling away at work :)&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;If you&amp;#8217;d like to support The Family Gamers, there&amp;#8217;s two ways to do that. First, you can pick up some sweet sweet merch. Big thanks to Matt who just picked up a Play Games with Your Kids shirt, and to some other folks who nabbed some things after we announced it last week. If you want to check out our merch you can go to store.thefamilygamers.com&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;You can ALSO support us on Patreon, if that&amp;#8217;s more your speed. We have a few different support tiers from just a couple of dollars to show your appreciation &amp;#8211; which we appreciate &amp;#8211; up to five, ten, or even $20/month. There are all sorts of different rewards you can get, which we tried to make unique. You can see those at thefamilygamers.com/patreon.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;Music for The Family Gamers Podcast is provided with permission from &lt;a href="https://youbredraptors.com/"&gt;You Bred Raptors?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;The Family Gamers is sponsored by First Move Financial. Go to &lt;a href="https://firstmovefinancial.com/familygamers" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener sponsored nofollow"&gt;FirstMoveFinancial.com/familygamers&lt;/a&gt; to learn how the team at First Move Financial can help you pile up the victory points.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;div class="wp-block-image"&gt;&lt;figure class="aligncenter size-large"&gt;&lt;a href="https://FirstMoveFinancial.com/familygamers"&gt;&lt;img data-recalc-dims="1" decoding="async" width="682" height="214" src="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/firstmovefinancial_horiz_banner.png?resize=682%2C214&amp;#038;ssl=1" alt="First Move Financial - Financial planning for all stages of life. What's your first move?" class="wp-image-8840" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/firstmovefinancial_horiz_banner.png?w=682&amp;amp;ssl=1 682w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/firstmovefinancial_horiz_banner.png?resize=300%2C94&amp;amp;ssl=1 300w" sizes="(max-width: 682px) 100vw, 682px" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/figure&gt;&lt;/div&gt; &lt;p class="wp-block-paragraph"&gt;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The post &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/episode-425-learning-ela-skills/"&gt;Episode 425 &amp;#8211; Learning in Board Games: ELA Skills&lt;/a&gt; appeared first on &lt;a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com"&gt;The Family Gamers&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;</description>

The Family Gamers Podcast

The Family Gamers

Episode 425 – Learning in Board Games: ELA Skills

JUN 29, 202652 MIN
The Family Gamers Podcast

Episode 425 – Learning in Board Games: ELA Skills

JUN 29, 202652 MIN

Description

<figure class="wp-block-post-featured-image"><img data-recalc-dims="1" fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" width="800" height="519" src="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?resize=800%2C519&#038;ssl=1" class="attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image" alt="" style="object-fit:cover;" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?w=800&amp;ssl=1 800w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?resize=300%2C195&amp;ssl=1 300w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Ep425-ELASkills.jpg?resize=768%2C498&amp;ssl=1 768w" sizes="(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px" /></figure> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Listener request today! We&#8217;re going to talk about ELA skills and board games to support them.</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:00:00 Fact for 425</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">The most expensive film produced is <em>Avatar</em> (USA, 2009), with an estimated production budget of <strong>$425 million</strong>. <em>Avatar</em> went on to achieve a worldwide box-office gross of $2.9 billion – the highest of all time.</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">Sponsor Message</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">You can set up a totally free call by going to <a href="https://firstmovefinancial.com/familygamers" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener sponsored nofollow">firstmovefinancial.com/familygamers</a> today.</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:03:30 What We&#8217;ve Been Playing</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring &#8211; Trick-Taking Game</em> *<br><em>Stew</em><br><em>Cat Rescue</em> *<br><em>Trio</em> (<a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/trio/" type="post" id="40375">our review</a>)<br><em>boop</em> (app version * &#8211; <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/boop/" type="post" id="31228">we love <em>boop</em></a>, not sure this is the best way to play it)</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">(*) first time mentioned on The Family Gamers Podcast</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:14:45 The Family Gamers Community</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/posts/4436330106656445" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Welcome to our newest members!</a></p> <h3 class="wp-block-heading">#Backtalk</h3> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">We asked you about summer board gaming plans.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Read the answers on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/posts/4425496841073105">Facebook</a> or <a href="https://discord.com/channels/1157003438425653379/1239323617368604672" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">#backtalk channel</a> of the Discord.</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:20:50 Patreon Shoutout</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Shouting out our Patreons! Check out the tiers at <a href="https://thefamilygamers.com/patreon">thefamilygamers.com/patreon</a>, and you can see our merch at <a href="https://store.thefamilygamers.com/">store.thefamilygamers.com</a></p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:22:00 ELA Learning in Board Games</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">There&#8217;s lots of subjects that we can talk about when talking about learning through board games. There&#8217;s the hard sciences, there&#8217;s math, and then there&#8217;s the more liberal arts side of education, which is important, but a lot more difficult to teach or work through with games.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">The best way to practice ELA is through just doing more reading and writing. But you can <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/reading-skills-boardgames/">support foundational skills</a> through work with board games, and also inspire more practice for <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/gameschool-ela-math/" type="post" id="17704">older kids with &#8220;gameschooling&#8221;</a>.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">We split the &#8220;older kid&#8221; skills into three groups, with games for each:</p> <h3 class="wp-block-heading"><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/reading/">Reading</a></h3> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">You&#8217;re looking for chunks of prose text (not a rule book, not just a few words of flavor text) that will force some practice. This is for fluency, simply encountering more text in more ways.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>Tales of the Arabian Nights</em> &#8211; roll &amp; move blended with adventure choices (read chunks of story)</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Look for sequential text &#8211; that has a beginning, middle, and end. But doesn&#8217;t have to be long! Games like <em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/her-story-board-game/" type="post" id="31173">HerStory</a></em> or <em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/trekking-through-history/" type="post" id="34091">Trekking through History</a></em> have a few sentences on each card.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>Above and Below</em> or other similar <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/red-raven-games/" type="post_tag" id="361">games from Red Raven</a> will have you read chunks in the rulebook that are short stories. Choose a path after reading some dialogue and description!</p> <h3 class="wp-block-heading">0:32:30 Writing</h3> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Writing is a hard skill to build on in games. Penmanship can be improved through simple practice. But the harder skill to build is &#8220;how to tell a story&#8221; (creative writing).</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tall-tales/" type="post" id="26005">Tall Tales</a></em> has players physically WRITE DOWN a scene based on a prompt and restrictions. Then all the story ideas are read out loud. One is chosen to be the &#8220;real&#8221; story and the next round must build off that.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/untold/" type="post" id="3986">Untold: Adventures Await</a></em> is an RPG/storytelling game using Story Cubes. It provides a lot of scaffolding to assist. But you could do much of it with just the StoryCubes and a piece of paper.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/bear-in-mind/" type="post" id="58994">Bear in Mind</a></em> uses storytelling as an aid to memory!</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Of course, all <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/roleplaying/" type="post_tag" id="138">role-playing games</a> can encourage improvement in creative story telling.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/classic-reviews-dixit/" type="post" id="2707">Dixit</a></em> is a story-telling game. Normally the storyteller is trying to match with just 1-2 players, not everyone. But you can change the rules around this!</p> <h3 class="wp-block-heading">0:39:00 <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tag/word-games/" type="post_tag" id="336">Spelling &amp; Vocabulary</a></h3> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Talk about a tough skill to teach or practice! Most word games are pretty punishing for bad spelling. But there are a few that can be used for practice and improvement. (We did a <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/episode-346-room-to-grow-word-games/">Room to Grow on this topic</a> a few years ago.)</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>Bananagrams</em> &#8211; especially when using <a href="https://boardgamesforallages.com/b-mod/bananagrams-b-mod/">B-mods for younger kids</a>!</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/illiterati/" type="post" id="33717">Illiterati</a></em> &#8211; which is a cooperative game: everyone can assist each other in making words or sharing letters. And the supervillain theme can give an extra little push for a kid on the fence about a word game.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>Scattergories</em> &#8211; mostly for vocabulary (but also penmanship!)</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em><a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tapple/" type="post" id="21949">Tapple</a></em> / <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/tapple-10/" type="post" id="44589"><em>Tapple 10</em> </a>&#8211; can pull in younger kids even if they&#8217;re not competitive. &#8220;What are other items in this category?&#8221;</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:43:00 Have you used games to help kids practice ELA skills?</h2> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">What other games would you recommend?</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading">0:45:00 New Backtalk Question</h2> <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img data-recalc-dims="1" decoding="async" width="700" height="350" src="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Backtalk_treat_games.jpg?resize=700%2C350&#038;ssl=1" alt="Backtalk: How do you treat your games?" class="wp-image-62437" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Backtalk_treat_games.jpg?w=700&amp;ssl=1 700w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/Backtalk_treat_games.jpg?resize=300%2C150&amp;ssl=1 300w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" /></figure> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">When thinking about games that you play with your family, how do you treat them? What happens if a card gets bent, for example?</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Tell us <a href="https://discord.com/channels/1157003438425653379/1239323617368604672" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">on the #backtalk channel</a> on our Discord, or <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/posts/4438156919807097" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">in our Facebook community</a>.</p> <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Find Us Online:</h3> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Facebook: <a href="https://www.facebook.com/familygamersaa" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">@familygamersaa</a> and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/familygamersaa/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">thefamilygamers.com/community</a><br>Twitter (X): <a href="https://twitter.com/familygamersAA" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">@familygamersaa</a><br>Instagram: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/familygamersaa/">@familygamersaa</a><br>TikTok: <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@familygamersaa/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">@familygamersaa</a><br>Bluesky: <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/familygamersaa.bsky.social" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">@familygamersaa</a><br>Threads: <a href="https://www.threads.com/@familygamersaa" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">@familygamersaa</a><br>Youtube: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/TheFamilyGamers">TheFamilyGamers</a></p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">or join the Family Tabletop Community on Discord! <a href="https://thefamilygamers.com/discord">thefamilygamers.com/discord</a></p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Or, for the most direct method, email us! [email protected] and [email protected].</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">PLEASE don&#8217;t forget to subscribe to the show, tell your friends about the show, and leave us a review at <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-family-gamers-podcast/id1031290391">Apple Podcast</a> or whatever your podcast subscription source is. We&#8217;re also on Amazon Music, <a href="https://tunein.com/podcasts/Kids--Family-Podcasts/The-Family-Gamers-Podcast-p1151589/">TuneIn</a>, and <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/5T4hCWTyqdY2Io4fslCbOl">Spotify</a>.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">You can also now find us on YouTube Music! So pull it up and give us a listen while you&#8217;re toiling away at work :)</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">If you&#8217;d like to support The Family Gamers, there&#8217;s two ways to do that. First, you can pick up some sweet sweet merch. Big thanks to Matt who just picked up a Play Games with Your Kids shirt, and to some other folks who nabbed some things after we announced it last week. If you want to check out our merch you can go to store.thefamilygamers.com</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">You can ALSO support us on Patreon, if that&#8217;s more your speed. We have a few different support tiers from just a couple of dollars to show your appreciation &#8211; which we appreciate &#8211; up to five, ten, or even $20/month. There are all sorts of different rewards you can get, which we tried to make unique. You can see those at thefamilygamers.com/patreon.</p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">Music for The Family Gamers Podcast is provided with permission from <a href="https://youbredraptors.com/">You Bred Raptors?</a></p> <p class="wp-block-paragraph">The Family Gamers is sponsored by First Move Financial. Go to <a href="https://firstmovefinancial.com/familygamers" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener sponsored nofollow">FirstMoveFinancial.com/familygamers</a> to learn how the team at First Move Financial can help you pile up the victory points.</p> <div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large"><a href="https://FirstMoveFinancial.com/familygamers"><img data-recalc-dims="1" decoding="async" width="682" height="214" src="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/firstmovefinancial_horiz_banner.png?resize=682%2C214&#038;ssl=1" alt="First Move Financial - Financial planning for all stages of life. What's your first move?" class="wp-image-8840" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/firstmovefinancial_horiz_banner.png?w=682&amp;ssl=1 682w, https://i0.wp.com/www.thefamilygamers.com/wp-content/uploads/firstmovefinancial_horiz_banner.png?resize=300%2C94&amp;ssl=1 300w" sizes="(max-width: 682px) 100vw, 682px" /></a></figure></div> <p class="wp-block-paragraph"></p> <p>The post <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com/episode-425-learning-ela-skills/">Episode 425 &#8211; Learning in Board Games: ELA Skills</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.thefamilygamers.com">The Family Gamers</a>.</p>