Dixit – a nice game for the end of a course

I haven’t updated my blog for a while, but I was quite busy passing my driving licence test, enjoying May minibreak (we had a week off!) and now making tests, correcting tests, writing certificates… oh, the joyous time for the teachers!

So, in order to make our life easier I want to share a really nice board game called Dixit. I used to play it with friends, but I decided to try it with my intermediate+ students who apparently fell in love with the game. It’s very easy to play and is perfect as an activity at the end of the course when the students know each other and are used to their specific ways of thinking.

The main point is to decipher people’s connotations – one person (a storyteller) puts a card on a table (without showing it) and says the clue: phrase/ word/ film title/ name etc. The rest of the players try to find a matching card from those 6 they have in hand (still, no showing). Then the cards are shuffled, showed and players must decide which card the storyteller chose. That’s really funny, because the cards are rather bizarre:

I played the game yesterday and I remember clues like ‘Hitler‘ (strangely, that was pictured by the kitty you can see in the picture above), ‘Middle Ages‘, ‘amniotic fluid‘ or ‘Maths’. That is why I recommend Dixit for the students and teachers who have known each other for a while – we all must be prepared for awkward situations (yup, a student went with a clue ‘vagina’ and we had pretty much fun when we saw all the cards, but then again, we’ve known each other for 4 years).

Meanwhile I realised the game is pretty good for the younger and less advanced students, they might use simpler vocabulary and grammar and have just as much fun as the older ones. Plus, for them it’s a real fun to play a real game (not created for educational purposes) in English!

Try the game and have fun! Holidays are almost here!