Quandary Game: SnapThought Prompts (With ELL Support)

Have your students signed up for My BrainPOP? If so, they’ll be able to take snapshots during Quandary game play with the SnapThought® tool! MyBrainPOP is available to BrainPOP Educators with 24/7 district- or school-wide subscriptions, and is easy for you to sign your students up. Check out our My BrainPOP FAQs for more info.

The SnapThought® tool allows students to capture significant moments in their gameplay with opportunities for brief written reflection. To use the tool, start by making sure students are logged into My BrainPOP with their own individual accounts. Once students are logged in, the SnapThought® tool will appear below any games that offer this capability.

During gameplay, students can click on the Snapshot tool up to 5 times per game. A thumbnail is generated and stored on the bottom left of the screen.  At any point in the game, students can click on their snapshot(s) and type a caption or response to a prompt, and save or submit it to your teacher’s account where you can view their data.

Keep in mind that students can take a snapshot during the game and then add the captions later. You may want to provide this alternative to avoid interrupting the flow of game play.  You can use the [game name] snapshots to facilitate discussion around game play and strategies, or have students submit the snapshots to you for assessment or accountability.

With Quandary, you can use the SnapThought® tool with any or all of the following prompts:

• Take a snapshot of Get Your Facts Right after you have sorted all the facts, opinions and solutions, but before you click ‘Finish’. In the caption of your snapshot, explain the difference between a fact, an opinion, and a solution.

• Take a snapshot of Decision Time after you have chosen a solution but before you click ‘Finish’. What made you choose the solution you chose? Was it hard to make the decision, and if so, why?

• Take a snapshot of What Will They Think? after you have sorted the cards but before you click ‘Finish’. Did you take into account other people’s points of view when making your decision? Who did you listen to and why?

• Take a snapshot of the Closing Comic. What was good about the outcome of your solution? What could have been better? Can you come up with any other solutions to the dilemma?

You might also want to use the SnapThought® prompts below, which were developed with English Language Learners (ELLs) in mind.

SnapThought® prompts focused on game content in Episode 1, The Lost Sheep:

• Take a snapshot of screen 1 in the Opening Comic. Describe the problem. Why do the colonists think the yashors did it?
• Take a snapshot of screen 2 in the Opening Comic. What is the quandary? What two viewpoints do you see on this page?
• Take a snapshot of the Investigate the Viewpoints screen showing a colonist’s viewpoint about the solution, plus a fact that can either strengthen his/her argument or change his mind.
• Take a snapshot of the Arguments For screen. Show the colonist who has the strongest argument in support of, or for, the chosen solution.
• Take a snapshot of the Arguments Against screen. Show the colonist who has the strongest argument against the chosen solution.

SnapThought® prompts focused on language usage and/or vocabulary during Quandary game play:

• Take a snapshot of any screen that has a word you don’t know. Look up the word, then write what you think it means in your own words, and use it in a sentence.
• Take a snapshot of screen 2 of the Opening Comic. Look at the expression “to cool off.” Describe a situation when you might tell someone to cool off.
• Take a snapshot of screen four of the Opening Comic. Write two nouns that mean “argument;” a noun that means “help;” a verb that means “depend on;” and an expression that means “perspective.”
• Take a snapshot of the last screen of the Opening Comic. Look at the sentence: “But if you thoughtfully consider everybody’s point of view, Braxos will thrive.” Rewrite this sentence in your own words. Make sure you think of a different way to say the words in bold.
• Look at the Get Your Facts Right section of the game. How do you know when a sentence is a fact, solution, or opinion? Copy the signal words, or clues, that help you decide.