The Purpose of Guessing Game - Essay Example

1. Materials for the game

Pentel pen, paper, tape, hat, container, and chair.

1. Duration

1 minute for each round.  The number of rounds can be indefinite but ideally, it should be limited to around 15 to 21 rounds. 

Each team can have a couple of time-outs with a duration of two minutes to regroup and restrategize.

• Set up
• Words and concepts about Human Resources will be written legibly on a piece of paper and then placed on a container.
• Each team will pick a paper from the container for a team member to guess
• The participant picking the concept will only have one chance to change the paper picked up.
• The participant will sit on a chair facing his or her team wearing a hat where he or she will guess the word written on a piece of paper pasted on his or her hat

1. Mechanics of the game

• The participant will have to guess the HR word and concept written on the paper that is pasted on the hat.
• The participant who would guess the concept or word is only allowed to ask questions to team members answerable by “YES, NO, or COULD BE”.
• Team members can only provide feedback with a “YES, NO, or COULD BE”
• The duration of guessing is 1 minute
• The moderator can remind the guessing participant to reframe questions to be only answerable by “YES, NO, or COULD BE”
• The moderator can disqualify the round of the team if the answer provided is not “YES, NO, or COULD BE”.
• The team who garner the most points win

1. Summary

The game is an ideal way to teach students concepts and terms about Human Resources without them realizing they are already learning it because they are having fun.  The guesser will have to think creatively to pinpoint the word and concepts written on the paper.

If a certain concept or word is unclear, team members can either research for clarification or better yet, ask the teacher to help explain and clarify the word or concept.  Still, the participants are learning.

The restrategizing aspect of the game will teach the players about their lapse in their communication techniques and from their mistakes apply remedial measures to improve performance just like in an organization.  They could also learn from the other team.

The teammates and opposing team will also inadvertently think about the term and concept and will learn what it is all about. 

Each team will also learn how to communicate properly so that they could guess the word and concept given the limited feedback of “YES, NO, or COULD BE”.  This would make the players appreciate how susceptible people are to miscommunication. 

The process will also teach the students the value of clear communication in an organization realizing the difficulty of guessing concepts and ideas when handicapped by less-than-ideal situations such as having noise in communication, not having all the information needed, and not transmitting thoughts.

1. Variations

The game can be applied to any subject.  Only the words can be changed to suit the need of a particular subject.  The game can also be made more challenging by letting the opposing team write the words that their opponents will have to guess.  Of course, they would naturally make the concept more difficult for another team to guess pushing the learning process to extend to more complicated concepts that would entice the students to study more to win the game without them realizing that they are already studying the subject.