Context
Summer holidays are usually times of rest and relaxation for schoolchildren, pupils and students after a year of hard work. However, due to the non-existence of healthy play activities and relaxation areas in the city of Lokossa, young people are almost lost and become the target of idleness or even numerous slippages including alcohol and smoking, non-pregnancies. desired, STDs and other diseases, petty crime, etc. One strategy to avoid such unfortunate situations is to organize healthy activities that allow young people to relax while improving their academic skills. It is in this context that we initiated a word game competition called Défi Scrabble in order to improve the vocabulary of young people in a playful and competitive spirit.
Objective of the activity
• Enrich the vocabulary of learners through a sane and relaxing activity during the long school holidays.
Implementation of the activity
Eighteen schoolchildren, pupils, students and others passionate about word games fought hard battles in two formats of the game of scrabble on July 26 and 27, 2019.
These are classic scrabble and duplicate. Indeed, scrabble is a game of letters which invites two to four competitors to write in turn words of the French language and other borrowings on a grid whose squares are variously weighted. The winner of a scrabblesque encounter in its classic version being the one who obtained the most points due to the variety of the indices of each letter and the weightings of each square of the grid. Moreover, the specificity of the duplicate lies in the fact that all the competitors play simultaneously on the same draws, each player having his own grid. Eliminating the luck factor and putting all the players on a level playing field, the winner is therefore the one who has managed to collect the most points or percentage relative to the greatest possible number of points at the end of the game.
Funding and partner
At a total cost of 77,500 FCFA, this activity was fully funded by our organization. In addition, we benefited from the technical support of the Geniuses Scrabble Club of Lokossa which supervised the various classic and duplicate matches.
Results obtained and quantified impact
After two days of epic meetings, the competition delivered its two champions. They are Mr. Seth Agossou, student in Première D and champion of classic scrabble; and Mr. Basile Loko-Dossou, Teacher of Philosophy and champion of the duplicate version. They were highly distinguished by trophies and scrabble packs. In addition, all eighteen (18) participants were provided with school supplies.
Difficulties encountered and solution approaches
We had no major difficulties in carrying out this project. In addition to the recurring headache of financing activities, the competitors due to come from the municipality of Dogbo were not able to honor their commitments. This did not prevent the good organization of the competition and the realization of its objective, that of being a healthy distraction of acquiring language skills during the long school holidays in the Mono.
