Blue Orange Games, known for their “hot games for a cool planet,” continue to invent clever games for kids that are friendly to our environment. Their latest member of the family, “ChickyBoom,” calls on fine motor skill and balance, requiring slow, precise movements to remove a chick, bale of hay or wagon wheel delicately placed along the chick’s perch. Take turns plucking pieces off the balance beam without letting it topple. After the perch is dumped, collect your pieces and call upon your math skills to count up the numbers on each one to see who has the highest number to declare victory.
This simple game of balance, math and strategy can be used effectively as a reinforcer for articulation and language therapy. I have written in a previous blog of the merits of good board games for teaching social language to children on the autism spectrum, and this is another such game that is simple enough with quick turns, but can be used to teach social skills as well as concepts such as high/low, same/different, heavy/ light and center.
I’ve used it to reinforce articulation learning by practicing sounds and taking a turn, or teach language skills like irregular past tense verbs as we “took” off a piece, “saw” where we put it, “put” it in our pile, “got” the block in the center, or declared that the chick “fell.”
Kids love the impish looking chicks and try to pluck them off first.
See my full review of “ChickyBoom.”
