Work Hard, Play Card

There’s magic in a deck of cards, and it doesn’t have to be a sleight of hand! Dive into the world of playing cards with your students with a discussion to see who is already familiar with cards, card games they know and any fun tricks! Then, spark curiosity by embarking on a full-group research project all about the history of playing cards.

Some questions to get you started are:

• Where did the concept of modern-day playing cards originate?
• Are there different types of cards in different cultures?
• And why does a deck contain 52 cards?

Once your students have some context for playing cards, ask each of them to learn a card game they’ve never played before!

Some great places to start may be asking an adult in their life to pass down a nostalgic game, looking up a card game that’s important to their culture or researching a game from another country.

Once everyone has done this, have students break into groups and share their games with one another, rotating every ten minutes. You’ve created a card game festival in your very own classroom!

To support this unit, use the Dealer’s Choice Handout.