LearningTip #7: Content Riddles
Provide Fun, Meaningful Learning for Children

By Joyce Melton Pagés, Ed.D.
Mother of two children, President of KidBibs

Children love riddles and guessing games.  Content riddles can provide fun thought-provoking fun while traveling or support the learning of content/information at school.   Playing riddle games with the information that children have learned can be used with young children and older children.  These riddles generally involve giving childen clues---one at a time---and having them guess the word after each clue.  It usually works best to give general clues first; then progressively more specific clues can be provided to guide the child's thinking toward the word.

The following example (which can be spoken as a game or written as an instructional strategy) shows how this strategy works. 

What am I?
 
  I am very important to you.
(The child generates possible answers. 
These ideas can be written down.)

You use me many times every day.
(The child eliminates previous responses
that don't fit and adds new possibilities.)

Animals and plants use me too.  
(The child eliminates previous responses
that don't fit and adds new possibilities.)

I fall from the clouds and flow in rivers to the ocean.
(The child eliminates previous responses
that don't fit and adds new possibilities.)

You need me when you are thirsty and when it is
time for you to take a bath.  
(The child eliminates previous responses
that don't fit and adds new possibilities.)

What am I? 
(The child has probably gone from a wide variety
of possible terms with the first clue to the
correct, focused answer: water.)


Riddles can be composed for almost any word.  Young children will enjoy doing this with things in their room/home, foods they like, and people they know (as a "Who am I?" game).  Older children can do this on a wide variety of words related to school, hobbies, and other words that they know.  Once they've figured out one or two of your riddles, they'll probably enjoy composing one to "trick" you.  As they have more experience with this strategy, they will learn how to give clues from general to specific.

Riddles can reinforce the information that children have learned and get them to start mentally organizing words into categories (animals, parts of the body, forms of transportation, etc.).  This strategy also helps children learn how to characterize and describe things.   Further, if they are reading or hearing riddle clues, this strategy improves their reading or listening comprehension.  In addition, children engage in higher level thinking as they apply the information that they have read/heard in the riddle to the whole collection of words that they know.  Finally, having children take turns formulating riddles refines their language skills and encourages even more higher level thinking.

This article explains a general riddle strategy for parents and teachers to use.  LearningTip #8 provides some specific riddle activities for parents and teachers to use as travel activities or to strengthen the child's learning of information.

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