READY, SET, GO!

DUCK DRUM DOLPHIN DAISY DRAGON

THE SECRET LIES IN ONE COMMON LETTER.

PREPARATION

Each player comes up with his or her own list of five one-word common objects or things without revealing the list to the other players. No names allowed! All five words must begin with the same letter. (For example, Player 1’s list might be duck, drum, dolphin, daisy, dragon.) The player choosing the words should NOT reveal his or her starting letter.

OBJECTIVE

Players must guess as many words as they can before anyone else!

GAME TIME

Player 1 begins by telling the other players how many letters are in each word. On their own sheets of paper, the other players draw dashes representing the letters in each of the five words. Then everyone places numbers under each dash from left to right, starting with 1 as the first letter of the first word, 2 as the second letter of the first word, etc. (Spaces and punctuation don’t count.) If there are only three letters in the first word, then the number 4 would be the first letter of the second word, and so on.

The words duck, drum, dolphin, daisy, dragon would look like this:

The player to the left of Player 1 writes down a letter on a separate piece of paper and shows it ONLY to Player 1. Without revealing the letter to the other players, Player 1 says out loud where that letter fits in all five words. (For instance, if someone showed Player 1 the letter O in the above example, Player 1 would say, “That letter is 10 and 25.”) The player who asked for the letter knows exactly what letter is in those two spots, but the other players only know that those two spots contain the same letter.

Players take turns asking for a letter secretly. When players think they have figured out one of the words, they raise their hand. Player 1 asks that player which word and to say his or her answer out loud. If the player is correct, he or she earns points for guessing it before anyone else. If he or she is wrong, that player cannot guess again for that specific word! (Player 1 writes down players’ names next to words they cannot guess again.) Only one guess per word per player. Players keep guessing until all five words are found and scores are tallied (see “Scoring”).

Player 2 then chooses five words that begin with the same letter and tells the other players how many letters are in each of her words, and so on.

SCORING

Players earn 5 points for guessing a word correctly. Tally the scores from each player’s set of words to find a grand total and an overall winner.