Two's Company, Three's a Crowd

Two's Company, Three's a Crowd is a card game designed to encourage creative thinking and recall or recognize compound words given clues.

Directions:

Prepare the following cards. Words in black are to be placed on the front of the card; words in blue (answers) are to be placed on the back.

1. strong, block, line
   head
2. sea, head, light
   read
3. glue, bell, house
   school
4. hot, house, food
   dog
5. notebook, news, airplane
   paper
6. tree, cake, cup
   fruit or tea or coffee
7. day, weaver, catcher
   dream
8. book, furniture, up
   cover
9. machine, out, line
   time
10. boat, dream, green
    house
11. tub, water, bubble
    bath
12. bell, bonnet, feeling
    blue
13. full, light, new
    moon
14. hot, dog, school
    house
15. walk, pan, cup
    cake

Present the three words to the students. It is their job to find a word that when combined with the three will form compound words or well-known two word phrases.

For example: in letter A, combine the word "strong" with the word "head" to form "head strong;" with the word "block" to form "block head;" and with the word "line" to form "headline."

Options:

• Prepare the cards and place them in a learning center. Individual students can use them at a specified time or as an extra activity when their class work has been completed.
• Prepare the cards and present a few every day to the whole class. You may designate a specific time during the day as Two's Company, Three's a Crowd time or allow the students to work on the activity throughout the day as a free time activity.
• Award a small prize to the student or small group who answers an item correctly.
• Encourage students to create their own Two's Company, Three's a Crowd items.
• Use a word processing or label making program to create professional looking cards.
• Laminate the cards for durability.