Thinking Skills: The X=Y Game

A fun starter activity for students to develop creative thinking skills or help EAL students use the language of comparison.

When I first started using this game, I had no idea how popular it would turn out to be. Basically, the game invites students to identify similarities between two images.

I provide post-it notes and show students two images. The students then write down one or two words to indicate how the images are similar. Then they stand up and one by one say their response. All students with the same or similar ideas have to sit down. The students who are left standing are the ones who have ideas nobody else has used.

Then we play the game again and the aim is to have more students standing than in the previous round.

This is a highly enjoyable game for students and promotes:

• creative thinking
• innovative thinking
• ingenuity
• originality

I use this game in my English and EAL/ESL classes but the idea behind it can be adapted for many subject areas.