Best Games: Once Upon a Time

First up in the Best Games for the Classroom Series, we have Once Upon a Time, a card game that has been popular for a long time.  In fact, it won awards for being such a great game, including a Parent's Choice Award last year.  It inspires the imagination and can be a great way to help students hone writing skills, understand story elements, and explore the fantasy genre.

The object of the game is to use a deck of cards, each showing a story element, to collaboratively tell a story with the rest of the players.  You want to be the first to get rid of all your cards, but you have to do so by describing a story element using the cards in your possession.  At various times, other players can interrupt the narrative and continue it themselves, trying to get rid of their own cards.  Players have to think fast and rely not only on their knowledge of storytelling and fairy tales, but also their own ingenuity to win.  Each player has one card with a possible "ending" to the story, so each player is jostling to try to manipulate the story to their own end and get rid of their cards first.  

From the Parents-Choice.org site:

"Once Upon a Time requires attention and problem solving abilities as the players try to figure out when they might be able to interrupt the current storyteller. It also draws upon players' creativity and imagination as they attempt to expand the plot and develop characters."

 

Check out the publisher's list of how the game can be useful for students.

The game can get silly and fun, as seen in the video below.  There are also versions of the game where players can make their own deck with elements they choose and draw themselves.  Students can add their own favorite characters, original characters or silly elements to that type of deck.  

The storytelling possibilities are endless with this game.  Watch below to see how players have to think, create a story, and cleverly find ways to use the story elements in their hand: