How I Use Games To Learn A Language

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I went into my local dry cleaners at the weekend and the lady behind the till spotted my wife’s Italian accent.

Apparently she is learning Italian too, and we had a chat for about 30 minutes between us about learning Italian.

We spoke about ways to learn and she said she loves doing crosswords in Italian. She also taught me the word for crossword in Italian but I’ve forgotten it! @Ottavia-Mandarin_Simplified_HS maybe you can help :slight_smile:

Anyway we spoke about how useful games are when learning a language and that brought me onto my favourite Italian game show, Caduta Libera.

It’s a fun word game where people have to fill in the blanks to create a word. Whilst it’s a level above me I often get 3-4 correct per episode which is quite a nice feeling (this without subtitles too).

I wondered if any of you use word games, either on paper or TV, to learn a language.

BONUS || one of our writers, Elisa from Italy, wrote this great article about her favourite Italian TV game show.

FUN FACT || she actually appeared on the first one in the list. I watched and she did a great job!

LINK || 10 Best Italian Game Shows (+ Find Out Where To Watch) 🇮🇹

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There’s no way I could see this post and not comment about Chinese chess!

aka: 象棋 xiàngqí

This game is a super fun way for chess learners to learn/reinforce certain vocab, like:

  • 象 (xiàng) - Elephant

  • 马 (mǎ) - Horse

  • 炮 (pào) - Cannon

  • 兵 (bīng) - Soldier

  • 河 (hé) - River

It also has a few ‘cultural’ differences from Western chess, which adds some interesting context to the game! One example is the soldiers (equivalent to pawns) not being able to get promoted once they cross the other side, which some people say reflects the stronger presence of rigid hierarchies in Chinese culture :eyes:

:point_right: More info here if anyone wants to learn how to play: Complete Beginner’s Guide to Chinese Chess || Become a Pro

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Games are so much fun to learn a language!

My Chinese teacher used to make us play Taboo in Chinese and it was super fun and also very useful to improve the vocabulary skills because you had to make people guess the word you had on your card by explaining it using different Chinese words.

The queen of reality shows and games is @Hannah tho, she always have a new one for every occasion :laughing:

P.S. Crosswords in Italian is cruciverba :wink:

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One of the :goat:

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That’s the one!! Grazie