File Folder Games

At the end of my first year of teaching, I discovered that the last day of school is a great time to "dumpster dive".  Since many teachers are cleaning their rooms, and I love to re-purpose...this works out really well for me.  My great find that particular year was the old record storage rack you see below:

  I wasn't sure what I would use it for at first, but eventually found that my folder games worked great on this little jewel!

Most of my games are created with the following format:  The students in the group each receive an cut-out picture (A barn in this example), and then roll a die for the 6 items that belong with that cut-out.  The student who collects all 6 items first is the winner of the game.  This type of game works really well as a quick incentive to focus attention.

I typically use a mailing envelope or old CD covers as the storage space for the big object in the games, and then standard library pockets for the smaller objects.