I'm happy to announce that the King School PTO will sponsor an Academic Games team for 4th and 5th graders this year--for the first time ever! This exciting addition to our offerings is largely due to the efforts of the Vanek family. Please thank them for their efforts.
The text of an informational flyer from Mike Vanek shows below:
Dear Parents of 4th and 5th Graders,
We would like to invite you to an informational meeting about the new Academic Games program being offered for 4th and 5th grade students at King Elementary School. The meeting will be held Monday, September 11th from 7:00 to 8:00 PM in the King Multipurpose Room. This first meeting will be for interested 5th grade students and their parents. We will hold a separate informational meeting for 4th grade students and parents at a date to be announced later this fall. If your child attended King School last year and you were on the King PTO email list, you should have already received a message containing some basic information about the program.
At the beginning of the meeting, we will discuss our expectations with the students and introduce them to the game of Equations. Kids will then be dismissed to the playground, supervised by Mrs. Vanek, while Christy and I answer questions and distribute the tournament schedule to parents.
Practice times have been set for Monday and Thursday evenings, from 7:00 to 8:00 PM, and will be held in the King School Music Room. We look forward to meeting with you on Monday the 11th.
Sincerely,
Mike Vanek
What is Academic Games?
Academic Games (AG) is a group of games designed to test and improve a student's knowledge in several different subject areas. There are games that cover math, English, social studies, and logic. The primary purpose of AG is to make learning fun for students. All too often it seems, students turn off to Math, English, or Social Studies because they are bored or not challenged by the material. AG helps to solve that problem by making learning about the subjects more interesting and fun. There is also the added motivation to do well in order to succeed in competition.
Which games do students play in AG? *
The first game students learn is Equations, a mathematics game created by University of Michigan Law Professor Layman Allen in the mid 1960's. Players use numerals and mathematical symbols on special dice to create a goal, and then try to come up with a solution before their opponents.
Similar to the popular card game, "Set", On-Sets is a game that involves Set Theory, where students must find groups of colors using set operations.
Linguishtik is an English Grammar game, where students must find a word, and place it into a particular type of sentence.
On-Words is a word game involving spelling, counting, grammar, phonetics, word roots, inflectional endings, prefixes and suffixes
Presidents is an American History game that tests students' knowledge of the American Presidents, and the events that happened during their presidencies.
In Propaganda, students learn to recognize and understand different techniques of persuasion
Wff N' Proof is a game of symbolic logic where students must construct proofs to prove logical arguments that they create.
In World Card, students must research a particular topic and create a reference book to be used in competitions.
(These brief game descriptions came from the Michigan League of Academic Games website: mlagonline.com, where more information on games and rules can be found.)
* Our King Elementary students will be learning Equations, On-Sets, Presidents, and Propaganda.
