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The Beauty of Crossword Puzzles as a Teaching Tool
Posted by anne.grey | Start the discussion
Presenter: Davida Jordan.
Summary
In this presentation, Davida Jordan examines how crossword puzzles can become meaningful teaching and learning tools rather than simply fun classroom activities. Drawing from her experiences teaching ESOL, she explains how crosswords can encourage students to revisit vocabulary and concepts while practicing problem-solving, reading, and critical thinking in a different format.
Crossword puzzles can also encourage students to move beyond literal or linear thinking. A clue may require learners to consider a word, concept, or idea from another perspective before finding the answer. This process can help students become more comfortable with uncertainty, make connections between ideas, learn from mistakes, and experience the satisfaction of solving a challenging problem.
The session highlights several additional benefits, including learner autonomy, classroom equity, novelty, engagement, and a sense of mastery. Students can work independently or collaboratively and move through a puzzle at their own pace. Crosswords can also remove familiar material from its original context, giving students an opportunity to see whether they can recognize and apply what they have learned in a new situation.
Jordan demonstrates several tools instructors can use to create their own puzzles, including Flippity, Crossword Labs, Wordwall, Discovery Education’s Puzzlemaker, WordMint, and The Teacher’s Corner. Participants also complete a PCC-themed crossword and discuss ways puzzles might be used for warm-ups, review, pre-assessment, formative assessment, additional practice, or activities for students who finish other work early. The session encourages instructors across disciplines to experiment with crosswords as a flexible and approachable way to support learning.
Presentation Outcomes
- Explain how crossword puzzles can support learning beyond simple vocabulary memorization.
- Use crossword puzzles to encourage critical thinking, flexible thinking, literacy, problem-solving, and connections between concepts.
- Recognize how puzzles can support learner autonomy by allowing students to work independently, collaboratively, and at different paces.
- Use crosswords to help students practice applying familiar concepts when information is presented in a new or less familiar context.
- Identify opportunities to use crossword puzzles for warm-ups, review, pre-assessment, formative assessment, additional practice, or enrichment.
- Adjust puzzle difficulty through strategies such as word banks, fill-in-the-blank clues, scaffolding, repetition, and different clue formats.
- Use free or low-cost tools such as Flippity and Crossword Labs to create customized crossword puzzles for different disciplines and learning goals.
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