Teacher Support: Creating a crossword puzzle

Why

The Internet provides many resources for teachers including online facilities to create a crossword puzzle for printing and use in the classroom.
Crossword puzzles can be used in class to review terminology, definitions, and spelling resulting in greater retention of facts. A crossword is a good way to test knowledge of key concepts.
Using Bloom’s taxonomy, completing a crossword would require lower-order thinking skills. Have a look at the comments on the educational value of crossword puzzles on http://porsiemprevideomatch.blogspot.com/2011/07/educational-value-of-crossword-puzzles.html
There are many places online where you can create a crossword puzzle. We are going to use the website http://puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com/CrissCrossSetupForm.asp At this URL they call a crossword puzzle a cross-cross puzzle.
This exercise uses many word processing, picture, and Internet skills.

Before you teach this lesson let the students do a number of crosswords; let them see how the words intersect, and that clues need to be carefully worded. I have had the experience that a number of learners/students and even teachers have never done a crossword, so the experience of completing one is essential before creating one.
For some persons the joy of creating a crossword is the magic that a list of clues can be manipulated by a computer program into a crossword format. The lesson is always a magical lesson/experience.

Create and format a crossword

Creating the crossword

Look at the videos before you start
Plan the words to use in the crossword. Type and lay out your text as in the image. Use at least 10 words for the crossword on a theme.
Creating the text for the crossword

There is a space between the word and the clue
When a word is two words, such as ‘electronic mail’ you must make it into one word
Clues begin with a capital letter
Clues do not end with full stops
The clues are statements, not questions
The spelling and grammar are correct
Clues do not begin with 'The' or 'A' or 'An'

Use the following link to make the crossword: http://puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com/CrissCrossSetupForm.asp
Complete the boxes and then create your puzzle.
Look at the crossword puzzle that it creates. If it is too long or too wide go back and ‘Create my puzzle’ again.
Copy the contents of the web page, (using Control-A, then Control-C, and then Control-V), into Word. The crossword part is an image and the text can be edited in Word. Format the crossword text and remove the advertisements. Save the file.

Formatting the crossword

Give the crossword a heading. Make sure the wording of the heading matches the content of the crossword
Add instructions on how to complete the crossword - Possible instructions which you can change or improve or ignore:

Work in pencil before you ink your work.
Fill in the answers you know first. This will make it easier to find the words you are having difficulty with.

Instructions are near the top of the page, before the work on the crossword
Make the heading text larger than the body text
Make all the font in the document the same type
Check that there are no spelling or language errors in the heading or instructions
If you change the size of the crossword check that the boxes remain square
If you change the size of the crossword the boxes must be large enough to write the answer in
Make it look attractive with a suitable page border
Remove any advertisements
Add meaningful images to enhance the page
Use images that will be clear when printed
Try to fit the crossword and clues into one page
Provide a solution/memo/answer in crossword shape - suggestions below:

Print your crossword. Answer the questions in pen. Scan the answer and save it as a PDF OR photograph the crossword and insert the image into Word and save it as a PDF
Do a screen grab of the crossword, and save it as an image. Open Paint found on all PCs and in Paint 'write' on the picture/image. When finished insert the image into Word and save as a PDF.