Can even “Cut the rope” be used for promoting language skills?

This post is a follow up post on a very popular write up I did a few months back called ” Can even Angry Birds be used to promote language skills?“. If you are curious about the answer I would say about the popular game Angry birds and its relation to language skills, you can access the link and read it. For now, the task at hand is to introduce some of you to a new game I have caught myself playing many times throughout the week called “Cut the Rope”.

If you are not yet familiar with the game, cut the rope reminds me very much of Angry birds, as they are both apps that have a specific goal and a user can have many different strategies to reach the same goal. In Angry Birds, the goal is to remove all “pigs” from the scene with the least amount of birds; the goal on Cut the Rope is to use elements of physics to move a candy ball to a green monster’s mouth. Do not worry, this is a cute monster. Here is a video that shows what cut the rope is all about.

I am a big fan of utilizing fun, engaging activities to target any skills, of course as a speech therapist, I like it even more to use them to promote language skills. The best is that as kids are playing games, they won’t even necessarily need to know they are educational in any way. Cut the rope currently offers nine levels, each with 25 different activities that increase in complexity as you go. Since each new level, ads new tools you have new language, vocabulary and skills you can target with each new level. You can do all that by planning your sessions, envisioning all the great possibilities for learning, and just by being an professional who knows how to promote language learning.

As I played with the game I tried to identify potential goals and activities that can be implemented with cut the rope. Some are similar to what I have discussed on my post about Angry Birds, others are new and directly related to the items on the game.

Possible Activities/ Goals

1. Goal: use vocabulary to clearly describe  ideas, feelings, and experiences.

The vocabulary found on cut the rope increases with the levels. Here are some of the vocabulary that I was able to collect as I went through the different levels:

Verbs: cut, pull, drag, shoot, eat, release, move, point, wait, circling,

Nouns: candy, monster, rope, stars,length, level, strategy, air, circle, wheel, plunger.

Adjective: Long, short, hungry,  wrapped

The list of vocabulary is just a sample of possible words that can clearly be found on each level. You will be using the words often throughout reveal scenes, as your students also would as they play each level.

As for the activities… oh, this is my favorite part! You could have students describe each scene before completing them. Here is an example of all the language that could be used by your student to describe one of the scenes and steps to complete it:

“ As the candy is moving up the screen wrapped in a bubble and it passes through the wheels I can tap on the wheel to shoot the plunger. When the plunger attaches to the candy and it can pop the bubble and let it fall to catch the stars on the way to the monster’s mouth.“

Here the student was able to use vocabulary to clearly describe the level and you, a successful SLP!

2. Goal: Give, restate, and follow simple two-step directions.

There are several ways to work on this goal. The therapist can give students steps to complete the levels and the student has to follow the directions given orally to complete the level. It would be fun if sometimes you give wrong directions to double check that the student is really following your directions, not the intuitive  way to complete the level. If you have a group of students they can take turns giving each other one or two step directions, so while one student is working on following directions the other is working on giving directions.

3. Goal: Tell experiences in a logical order (chronological order, order of importance, spatial order).

This is one of the best app styles to work on telling experiences in a logical order as it offers several ways to reach the same end, and students can even talk about the different strategies they used to reach the same goal.

 

These are just three possible goals (also state standards) that can be targeted with Cut the Rope. I hope you enjoyed!

See you guys next time,

Barbara

 

Disclaimer: I have not received any payment or free reward for this post. I have no financial interest on this application.