Review Balls

I have a wonderful, fun way to incorporate reading skills, reading comprehension, vocabulary usage, cumulative math review, and world history analysis.

Say hello to my Review Balls!

I found these inflatable beach balls at the dollar store (Dollar General to be exact) this past summer. Each was $1. I couldn't pass them up, especially with their different sports designs.

No matter the subject I'm reviewing, I throw the ball to a student, and when they catch it, they must answer the type of question that their left thumb touches. For example, if I am using my Reading Story ball, and a student's left thumb touches the section that asks, "What was the conflict in this story?" then they answer it based upon the story we just read. If I am using my World History ball, and a student's thumb touches the "land (geography)" section, I would then ask them a question that has to do with the land or geographic features of the country or civilization we are studying. If a student answers a question correctly, he/she may throw the ball to another student. If a student answers the question wrong, he/she is out, and cannot catch until a new review starts.

Here are the questions I wrote for each ball:

Vocabulary (baseball design):
*Give the defintion.
*Use it in a sentence.
*Is it a verb, noun, or adj.?
*Give a synonym.

Reading (beach ball design):
*What is the conflict in the story?
*What is the mood in the story?
*What is the setting in the story?
*Name a round character.
*Name a flat character.
*What moral/ lesson could you learn from this story?

World History (basketball design):
*Land (geography)
*Religion
*Accomplishments
*Rulers
*Culture
*Mistakes (that the people made)
*Compare to today (compare the ancient civilization to the current one, or if it does not exist anymore, compare them to our own society today)

Math (soccer design)
This covers the different skills we learned throughout the whole year. The yellow spaces include skills we learned in the beginning of the year, and the black spaces focus on the skills we learned later in the year. If you want to use this throughout the school year, it might be best to only have your students answer questions in the yellow spaces. If you would like to review for a standardized or cumulative test near the end of the year, this would be a perfect activity, and be sure to use all of the spaces.
I named skills such as GCF (Greatest Common Factor), Order of Operations, Decimals, Fractions, Variables, Circumference, and Word Problems. Again, these are just skills to choose from, and then ask your students math problems that use the skill.

You can use review questions from a study guide, from a quiz or test, from their notes, or you can make up note cards to go along with the ball. (The note card idea might be best when using the Math ball, for it reviews many skills learned in our book.)

A simple sharpie and beach ball can go a long way. My students get so excited when they see me reach for a ball. "I love that game!" I hear one say. "Oh yes!" shouts another. I especially love to use this activity right before a test or quiz for one more last minute review, for it puts them in a more positive mood. (It also helps build confidence.)

It only took me a couple of hours (maybe) to make all of these. I blew them up first before I wrote on them. You can let the air out in order to store more easily and then inflate them again for the day of use.

So that's it for another easy breezy (also cheapy) resource idea. Recreate and enjoy!