Are you an educator looking for resources to support Black History Month? This fun and engaging Black History Month crosspatch puzzle (with letter hints) supports vocabulary building and encourages students to actively problem solve. Crosspatch puzzles are similar to crosswords. One of the main difference is that the clues are exclusively word clues and not organized in any order. Puzzle includes letter hints to support differentiated classrooms. Students fill in the blanks with the correct words.
Here are some ideas of how to solve the puzzle:
1) review the list of words to engage the brain
2) organize list of 20 words by number of letters in the word (cataloguing and organizing are problem solving strategies)
3) fill-in-the-blanks with the words that match with the letter clues
4) have students track progress by marking words as the puzzle blanks are filled (strategy of elimination)
5) identify words with the least number letters, or the most number of letters (another way to organize information)
6) fill-in-the-blanks that match these words
7) finally, scan the grid for intersection points of letters and match them with the remaining words in the list
Download the free puzzle to print and/or copy the file to your computer to complete is using Google Apps version.
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