Bingo for Teachers of Foreign Languages

If you teach a foreign language class, whether it be French, German, Spanish, even English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL or TEFL), or for that matter any language at all, you've almost certainly observed that students learn best and fastest when they actively participate in the class, especially if such participation includes the opportunity to converse in the language. Activities which encourage such participation are therefore very popular with language teachers - including, of course, educational games.

One game that you may not have considered is bingo. Many people tend to think of it as a game played in bingo halls or church basements, as well as online, often by older people, mainly as a social activity, but also for the opportunity to win relatively modest prizes. However, bingo is a very simple game that can easily be adapted to a wide variety of different situations, is quickly learned by students, and is ideal for use in education.

To play in the classroom each student is given a bingo card, and the teacher acts as the caller. However there are differences from the normal game - the main one being that usually special cards containing words (including the possibility of foreign vocabulary) are used. The teacher also has the option of changing the game play process, for example to encourage class discussion between calling each item.

Here are a few ideas for variations of the game suitable for use in a language class:

1. If teaching a language that uses a different alphabet (such as Greek, Russian, Arabic or Hebrew), you could prepare bingo cards with letters of that language's alphabet. Play a quick game at the start of every lesson, and you'll be amazed at how quickly students will learn to instantly recognize any character.

2. You could use cards with words in the foreign language (for example French), but make the calls in English. Conversely, you could use cards containing English words, and make the calls in the foreign language.

3. Language classes are of course mainly about learning the language, but if students are learning French or German, you probably also want to teach them at least a little bit about the people, geography and culture of France or Germany. Fortunately there's no reason why you couldn't, for example, play using cards containing the names of cities, foods, historical figures from the country, etc.

4. Even bingo cards containing numbers can be used. If you want your students to learn to recognize numbers in the language, call out the numbers in that language.

To summarize, there are a wide variety of ways that the game can be used to help with language teaching - and no doubt you can probably think of some more ideas too! One thing that you are probably wondering about though is where to get special bingo cards containing foreign characters or vocabulary? Well, the answer is simple... the simplest and cheapest thing to do is for you to print them from your computer. Free ready-to-use bingo printables can be downloaded from the Internet, or easy-to-use software for printing bingo cards (as many as you want, containing any items that you want) is available at a surprisingly affordable price.

By S. Tanna. For free bingo card printables, please go to http://www.bingocardscreator.com/

To create your own custom bingo cards, please go to http://www.bingocardprinter.com/

A History of Bingo

The origins of the modern game of bingo can be traced back to 16th century Italy. An Italian lottery called 'Lo Giuoco del Lotto D'Italia' was played every Saturday, a tradition which continues to this very day. This was the first state lottery to be played in Italy and despite the church's disapproval the popularity of this game of chance spread across the border to France where it was introduced as 'Le Lotto'. Hugely popular amongst wealthy Frenchmen from the late 1770s onwards, Le Lotto involved the use of wooden numbered discs which have developed over the centuries into the bingo balls used today.

The bingo bug had hit the continent and it was soon being played throughout many European countries, reaching Germany in the 1800s. The German version of the game had a slightly different purpose as it was used to help teach children mathematics and proved an effective yet fun way of learning multiplication tables.

Bingo's introduction into predominantly English speaking countries was down to the fate of one man - Edwin S. Lowe. Lowe was a toy salesman who lived and worked in New York and stumbled across a game being played at a carnival near Atlanta in Georgia. The game was called 'Beano', as each player was equipped with a handful of dried beans and a card with numbered squares. The games dealer selected numbered wooden discs at random and called out the number to the eagerly awaiting players. Each time a number was called out which was on the player's card it was marked off using a dried bean and the first player with a straight line of numbers had to call out 'beano' and was declared winner of the game

Sensing the excitement surrounding the game Lowe spotted potential at this early stage and introduced it to his friends in New York. Lowe's friends were equally captivated and during one game a female player was so excited by winning she called out 'bingo' instead of beano' and this is how the game was named.

Lowe quickly realised if the game were to be played by more people the number of combinations on the players cards needed to be increased. Wasting no time he enlisted the help of a Columbia University maths professor named Carl Leffler and by 1930 six thousand different combinations had been created. A bingo craze swept the United States and the game has since gone from strength to strength ever since, spreading to all corners of the universe.

The popularity of this game in modern society knows no bounds and it has even moved with changing technology as the availability of online bingo proves. Thousands of people nationwide are playing the game without even being in the same room, meaning the game's popularity is likely to continue in the 21st century.

Paul McIndoe writes for a digital marketing agency. This article has been commissioned by a client of said agency. This article is not designed to promote, but should be considered professional content.