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Classroom bingo

Sets for a group or a class of thirty, no two cards alike.

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Your cards

Which game
Where the words come from
45 themes, grouped by kind.
24 to 40 from this theme
1 to 120, all different
Border
Up to 40 characters, printed on every card and on the call list. Leave it empty for the title shown.
Your cardsCard 1 of 30

Classroom Bingo, card 1

RECESSPAINTINGSPELLINGNUMBERSREADINGMAPCHAIRPROJECTNOTEBOOKBULLETINFOLDERLOCKERFREEPOSTEREASELGLUECALENDARBACKPACKERASERSTAPLERWRITINGLUNCHBOXCRAYONBOOKSHELFCHALK

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Classroom Bingo, call list

Check off each word as you call it. 40 words in play.

  1. RULER
  2. STUDENT
  3. ALPHABET
  4. WRITING
  5. GLOBE
  6. POSTER
  7. ERASER
  8. FOLDER
  9. WHITEBOARD
  10. LOCKER
  11. LUNCHBOX
  12. CHALK
  13. TEACHER
  14. CHAIR
  15. PROJECT
  16. BOOKSHELF
  17. READING
  18. HOMEWORK
  19. PAINTING
  20. EASEL
  21. SHARPENER
  22. SCISSORS
  23. STICKERS
  24. CALENDAR
  25. DESK
  26. GLUE
  27. MARKER
  28. RECESS
  29. MAP
  30. BACKPACK
  31. LIBRARY
  32. COUNTING
  33. BULLETIN
  34. CLOCK
  35. NUMBERS
  36. STAPLER
  37. NOTEBOOK
  38. CRAYON
  39. PENCIL
  40. SPELLING

Created for free at puzzleandprint.com

Or take a set that is already made

Four sets sized for different groups. Every card within a set is different, and each prints on a page of its own after the call list.

Classroom bingo printable, small group: 6 cards, 5 by 5Classroom bingo, small group6 cards · 5 × 5Download PDF ↓Classroom bingo printable, half class: 15 cards, 5 by 5Classroom bingo, half class15 cards · 5 × 5Download PDF ↓Classroom bingo printable, whole class: 30 cards, 5 by 5Classroom bingo, whole class30 cards · 5 × 5Download PDF ↓Classroom bingo printable, young children: 12 cards, 3 by 3Classroom bingo, young children12 cards · 3 × 3Download PDF ↓

Every sheet here is free to print as often as you like. If one saved you time, the tip jar is on Ko-fi.

Bingo earns its place in a classroom because it is one of the few games where every child is engaged on every turn. There is no waiting for your turn, a call is a call for everyone at once, which is why it holds a room of thirty better than most activities that need no equipment.

The ready-made sets here use everyday classroom vocabulary and come in sizes for a small group, half a class, and a full thirty. There is also a 3 × 3 set for younger children or for a round that has to fit into the ten minutes before lunch.

The real use, though, is as a shell for whatever you are teaching. Any list of terms works: the parts of a plant, key dates, French numbers, the vocabulary before a unit test. Calling the definition instead of the word turns it from a reading game into a comprehension one without changing the cards at all.

Around thirty to forty words gives genuinely varied cards for a class that size. With exactly 24 every card holds the same words in a different order, which still plays fine but ends more predictably.

How many cards each call marks in a whole-class game of classroom bingo

On the whole-class set, each call marks a square on about 18 of the 30 cards, because every 5 × 5 card carries 24 of the 40 words around its free center. The exact number depends on the word: across these thirty cards the least common word is on 12 of them and the most common on 28. A first line usually arrives after about 12 calls, and nearly nine games in ten end between the eighth and the fifteenth call. The half-class set takes about 13 calls and the six-card small group set about 16. Playing on to a full card takes around 37 calls, close to the whole list.

The young children set behaves differently. Its twelve 3 × 3 cards hold nine words each and no free square, so a call marks a square on only two or three cards on average and a line comes after about nine calls. CRAYON, CLOCK and FOLDER are on none of the twelve cards, which makes them the three words to cross off the call list before a round with that set, or a call of any of them marks nothing for anyone. At twenty seconds a call, nine calls is three minutes, so two or three rounds fit into a ten-minute gap with time to check the winning cards.

Can classroom bingo be called by holding up the real thing

Yes, for most of the classroom list: holding up a ruler instead of saying RULER turns each call into matching an object to its written name, which suits children who are still learning to read. A teacher can lift PENCIL, ERASER, SCISSORS, GLUE, CRAYON, MARKER, NOTEBOOK, STAPLER, FOLDER, CHALK, SHARPENER and STICKERS straight from a desk or a drawer, and point at the WHITEBOARD, CLOCK, CALENDAR, GLOBE, MAP, DESK and CHAIR. Pointing at yourself for TEACHER and at a child for STUDENT works too, and so does pointing at a display for POSTER or ALPHABET if the room has one.

Five words are activities rather than objects, READING, WRITING, COUNTING, PAINTING and SPELLING, the only words on the list that end in ing, and they are better mimed than shown. The ones that cannot be shown at all, such as HOMEWORK, RECESS, PROJECT and LIBRARY, are simply called aloud, and mixing shown calls with spoken ones keeps readers and early readers in the same game. Check the room against the list before you begin: LOCKER, EASEL and BULLETIN are on it, and a classroom without them turns those three into spoken calls as well.

Common questions

What if two children win at the same time?

Call a second round to a different pattern, four corners or the whole card, and it settles the tie without reprinting anything. On the whole-class set two or more children finish a line on the same call in about one game in six, because all thirty cards draw on the same 40 words, and on the six-card small group set it drops to about one game in ten.

Can I use it for something other than vocabulary?

Yes: choose Write my own in the maker on this page and type your own terms, one per line or separated by commas. A 5 × 5 card needs at least 24 and a 3 × 3 card at least nine. Squares print letters only, so digits and spaces are dropped and anything under three letters is left out: spell numbers out in words, and keep the longer prompt, a definition or a question, for the call.

Why are the words smaller on some classroom bingo cards?

Each card prints all its words at one size, chosen so that its widest word fits a square, and WHITEBOARD, at ten letters, is the longest on the list. On the whole-class set the sixteen cards that carry it print at the smallest size, twelve of the other fourteen print one step larger, and the last two print at full size. The 3 × 3 cards have bigger squares, so every word on them prints at full size.

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