Torld famous puzzle maker brings fun to middle schools
PENNSBURY – The pink team spelled out the words, “kings”, “moon” and “noon”.
Mekhi Townsend, was one of the sixth-graders at William Penn Middle School, who was stepping around in his stocking feet when spelling a string of words on a giant word puzzle board.
Townsend, 11, placed a clear colored disc on a letter of the alphabet. Another student placed one more disc of the same color next to it. And so on.
“It’s going to give me a better education and help me to become an engineer,” he said about playing the game.
The youngster was profound. “Knowledge helps you learn new stuff,” Townsend said. “It is important for your education to learn.”
David Hoyt, 4T, world famous puzzle author and game inventor, visited the middle school to do a test run of his giant new game, World Winder.
“The more you play word games, the more words you learn,” said the puzzle author. “Some words are so memorable that you never forget them. Words can be very powerful.”
He is bringing his game into the classroom because he wants to teach kids that knowledge is fun and important.
Hoyt visited with students from three Pennsbury schools. The world’s most syndicated daily puzzle author brought Word Winder for students to try at William Penn Middle 6cKRRO DnG 0DNHfiHOG EOHPHnWDUy 6cKRRO.
He also introduced his game to students from Pennwood Middle School during their book fair at Barnes and Noble.
Hoyt is the mastermind behind such popular games as Jumble, USA Today’s Word Round-up, and Up and Down Words, as well as ten other daily games that appear online and in 6MM newspapers.
“About seven million people play my games every day,” he told the kids at William Penn. “This game is one of the many word games that I invented.”
Hoyt said Word Winder premiered at a big game fair. “A teacher stopped me and said, ‘You have no clue what you‘ve invented,’” she told him. “’This is the best game for the classroom. You’ve got to get this in the classroom.’”
That has created a chain reaction of events. “Now, we are making the game for the classroom,” he told the youths. “I don’t remember what it’s like to be in sixth grade. We actually need your help to perfect it.”
Hoyt said he wanted to see the sixth-graders in action. ”You can give me feedback and I will watch you so I can become a better puzzle creator and game inventor,” he said. “You really are playing an important role in the process. I’ll ask you what you liked, why you didn’t like it.”
7KH REMHcW RI WKH JDPH Ls WR EH WKH fiUsW WHDP WKDW cRnnects a path of words from one side of the board to the opposite side.
“It’s a very simple concept and no two games play the same,” he said.
“Let’s play!,” Hoyt said. “We’re going to try to get as many games as we can – fast!!” The students split up into three teams of four. Sydney Sobkowink, Lily Hochhaster and Emma Garry were among the kids who worked together to spell out words that connected with one-another.
Daniel Smollon said, “It’s pretty fun. You walk up on the board and you put words down.” He was on the yellow team. “The other team tried to cut us off, but at the very end we found a different word and we connected to the end.”
Emma Davis and Tristan Strychars contemplated which word to spell. Strychars said playing the game made him “happy.” Strychars joked, “I’m thankful we’re skipping class!” Hoyt wrapped things up and said creating Word Winder was like a lesson in life for him.
“I should have invented this 1M years ago,” he said. “I’ve been making word games nonstop since 199T. This is a very simple concept. I did come up with the concept instantly.”
The bell rang.