Play to Learn: Using Improv to Boost Academic, Social-emotional, and Speaking Skills 

Written by Kate Wiersema – This article is from AIM Issue 2 (released November 2023).

Fifth-grade students think they are pretty cool.

And, they aren’t wrong. They are the oldest kids in the school. They understand sarcasm, are beginning to have more meaningful friendships, and have much better style than I ever will. Unfortunately, worrying about being cool comes with some downsides and one of these is the fear of looking foolish in front of your peers.

I remember standing in front of a room full of children and dying a thousand deaths waiting for someone to respond to a question. I kept saying, it doesn’t matter if you are right, somebody please just try. That’s when it hit me, these kids are scared of something that they have never experienced. And if the biggest fear is fear itself, then it’s time to face that fear of being wrong.

Wrong Jeopardy was the first game I looked at and said, “Man, this improv thing could really help kids.” I have taught improv clubs and classes for over ten years. I have seen firsthand how great improv is for kids’ self-esteem, problem solving skills, and teamwork skills. However, this was the first time I realized that these games could be modified and played not for the sake of performance, but for the sake of education.

After utilizing games to improve social-emotional skills, I realized that games could be applied to other aspects of education. I started tinkering with performance improv games to modify them for use in classroom learning. Here are three games working on three different skill sets (social-emotional, academic, and speaking and listening). Take them! Play them! Yes, and away!

Wrong Jeopardy 

(Click here to watch a demo of Wrong Jeopardy.)

How many people? Three to five.

How do you play? The teacher picks the players and they stand in front of the audience. The teacher introduces the show and explains how this is the smartest group of people in the world. She then has each student make a ‘ring-in’ sound and introduce themselves. Students are encouraged to come up with a character that seems very smart. Example: Rings in.

“Hello, my name is Dr. Elizabeth Smith. I have my law degree from Harvard and have never had a B in my life.” The host gets questions that have one right answer that kindergarten students would know the answer to and asks them to the contestants, such as “What is one plus one?” or “What is the first letter of the alphabet?” Students ring in and answer the questions as incorrectly as possible. The teacher will react to the wrong answers and then at the end of each round, tell the correct answer. Rounds can last three to five questions, depending on the time limit.

Link to social-emotional learning: develop self-awareness – This game is all about confidence. I like playing this game at the beginning of the year. After each round, I ask the students how they feel. Usually they say it was fun. I ask them to check and see if the Earth has swallowed them whole. The students will never be as wrong as they just were, so they should have no fear of answering a question wrong or asking a question in front of this group of students now.

What have I noticed? After playing this game, I have noticed that children are more confident in speaking in front of others. They are also more willing to volunteer answers.

Dr. Know-it-all

(Click here to watch a demo of Dr. Know-it-all.)

How many people? Three to six.

How do you play? Students stand in front of the audience in a horizontal line. They will answer questions from the audience one word at a time. The teacher will help direct the students to answer. The best questions for these are how or why questions. Example: “Why is the sky blue?” When the students have finished the answer – or when the teacher thinks it is time – they are encouraged to take a bow.

Link to academics: restate questions, write complete sentences – This is one of my favorite games to teach students how to restate a question. In many types of testing, students must answer questions in complete sentences, restating the question. Before you play this game, review the steps of how to restate a question. Example: If the question is, ‘Why is the sky blue?’ you would start the answer with, “The sky is blue because...”

What have I noticed? When talking about writing responses, I can reference this game and students will remember that we have to restate questions.

Conducted Story

(Click here to watch a demo of Conducted Story.)

How many people? Three to six.

How do you play? The teacher pulls three to six students to the front of the room. He then gets a suggestion of a story that has never been written. Once the teacher chooses a title, he will explain to the students that only one person will be speaking at a time. When he points at the student, the student starts telling the story. When the teacher wants that student to stop talking, he cuts them off like a conductor does to an orchestra. Then, the teacher points to another student. This student must pick up exactly where the last student left off, be it at the end of a sentence or in the middle of a word. The teacher can jump around in the story, adding information or getting additional suggestions to integrate from the audience.

Link to speaking and listening: comprehension and collaboration – Students will need to listen actively to each other to make sure they continue the story. For older or more advanced students, the teacher could do eliminations based on students not repeating what was said before, but just naturally going in. For example, if one student said, “And then the boy ran towards…” and the next person repeated, “The boy ran towards,” an elimination would occur.

What have I noticed? Students can reference the parts of a story when reading and writing. They can tell me important elements that come in each part.