Word games

We have played a lot of word games over the last few years. So here they are in no particular order.

Boggle 16 dice which you shake and then look for words where the letters touch one another. The points are based on length of word. I found a useful handicap when my daughter was younger was that I was not allowed 3 letter words. This plus an initial bonus nicely evened up the game. We still regularly play this one.

Word Pool. AN ELC game. Each player takes a card with a picture on one side and the word on the other. The board is made up of lily pads with letters on. You throw a dice and then move that many spaces trying to collect the letters of your word. Surprisingly frustrating to play on occasions. We enjoyed it whilst in the learning to read stage but it has had no longevity.

Lexicon. A pack of letter cards with various suggestions for games. Initially I picked out a word ending, eg AT, then sorted the remainder of the cards into a single alphabetical set and then we searched for words with that ending. This was enjoyable in the learning to read stage. We have since progressed to playing the basic word game. Very portable and still played. Solitaire games also given.

Kan-u-go. Old card game rather like a poor man's Scrabble. Takes up a lot of space and the rules are rather unclear.

Scrabble and Junior Scrabble. Junior Scrabble starts with a preprinted board where the players match letters. The other side of the board varies from set to set but ours is a rainbow board which usefully penalises longer words thereby handicapping the adult. In starting to play Scrabble again we began with a bonus to the youngest players until they could beat us with it.

Upwords. Played like scrabble in that the words themselves crisscross but unlike Scrabble you need to modify words by building upwards to get the higher scores. A game where you look at words very differently. Can be easier for children because it is often shorter words that are better because they can be adapted more easily.

Bananagrams. This has 144 letter tiles that are played into a crossword grid. Each player starts with 21 tiles and then makes their grid until one player has completed it at which point all players must take another letter. A quick game. Again we handicapped ourselves by not letting adults have 2 letter words. The tiles themselves are very tactile and fun for children to form into words.

Letter Dice. A simple game with 13 letter dice which the player must form into words. Players take it in turns. Good for travelling

SHAKE spell. 7 dice this time but with a chance dice that dictates word length, becomes an extra letter or affects the score. Another quick game useful for travelling.

Got a minute. 7 dice in a cube with a timer. How many words can you make in a minute? Akin to Boggle.