📘 How to Play

Before You Start

• Arrange the class into two teams. The exact number of students does not matter.
• Ideally, students line up behind a row of desks to match the TV game show format.
• If you have an odd number of students, one student can be the behind-the-scenes operator, or BSO.
• The BSO needs the answers in advance and must keep them secret.
• The teacher takes the role of presenter from behind a desk.

Starting a Round

• Call the two captains to the front and position them at opposite ends of the desk.
• Reveal the first question.
• As soon as the question appears, both captains try to bang the desk as quickly as they can.
• The student who reacts first gives an answer.
• The BSO reveals the answer if it is on the board, or adds a cross on the correct side if the answer is wrong.
• The opposing captain then gets a chance to reveal an answer.
• Whichever captain revealed the highest answer chooses whether to play or pass.

Playing the Board

• The team with control tries to reveal the remaining hidden answers.
• The presenter asks each student in that team, in turn, for an answer.
• During this stage, students should not confer.
• The BSO reveals either the matching answer or a cross after each response.
• The BSO can use discretion, so answers do not have to be perfectly word-for-word.
• If all answers are revealed, that team wins the board.

Steals and Crosses

• If three crosses are revealed before the board is complete, control passes to the other team.
• The other team attempts a steal by trying to identify one final unrevealed answer.
• At the steal stage, the team may confer.
• The presenter asks the team for ideas, and the captain chooses one final answer.
• If that answer is correct, the team steals the board.
• If the answer is wrong, it is a failed steal and the original team wins the board.

Special Features

• If an answer with an orange background is revealed, that student wins a special prize.
• Sweets or another small prize work well for bonus answers.
• Click the next button to move on to the next question.
• At the start of each new board, the next player in each line comes to the front.

Winning the Game

• The game ends when all boards have been played.
• The team that has won the most boards wins the game.
• There is no built-in double money round, although you could make the final board worth double if you want to avoid a draw.
• Use the reset button if you want to replay the same game later.

Teacher Tips

• This works best when you create your own rounds based on the keywords students need for exams.
• The save and load features make it easy to reuse games and share them with colleagues.
• Keyword-based answers help students remember the exact terminology they need in written responses.

Example BSO Answers

The original notes included this example answer bank for the behind-the-scenes operator.