I, too, like word searches for the building of vocabulary. It is a way of teaching synonyms and antonyms and keeps new vocabulary words in front of the students so they see them. More exposure to new words better the chances they will make them their own and use them on a daily basis. I think they are great for ELL and at risk students. Motivation is key for these students and finding the words makes the students focus on word parts and the words themselves. I think the author is correct. Too many teachers have probably used them as busy work on a Monday morning or Friday afternoon so now must pay the price. Any teaching tool can be good and/or bad: it always depends on how it is being used in the classroom. Used wisely these can enrich the lesson. It was suggested that this is not a good use of student time at our school as well but I disagree. We have not been forbidden to use them but it is strongly discouraged. I use them but only to reinforce a particular skill.

I agree that word finds have little educational value. In a time when we are trying to produce thinkers and problem solvers, the passive act of locating words seems a waste of instructional time. If they are used as Jamie has mentioned, as a tool for teaching synonyms, antonyms, etc. they could prove useful as a quick activity but too many teachers use them as time-fillers. Crossword puzzles have a bit more instructional value but can also be used inappropriately. One way to up the instructional value might be to have students create word searches and crossword puzzles of their own using content words, literary terms, etc.

I love the idea of having kids create their own crossword puzzles. Seeing a student-written definition of a word would certainly help a teacher gauge that student's understanding. Molly had to create her own word search last week using her spelling words. It was definitely a time filler.

I see no educational value in word searches. Vocabulary is not built by matching and circling letters. Word searches are "busy work". Vocab lessons should focus on USING the vocab words.. not matching their letters. Play a matching game with the word and a definition or sentence so that they can see the word in CONTEXT rather than just as a group of letters.

As a parent of a child with dysgraphia, we have spent hours searching for words in word searches. We used various strategies (i.e., using a strip of paper and screening the list of letters vertically, horizontally, and on the diagonal. The time we spent evenings looking for scientific terms in science, history, etc. could have been spent studying content materials. I also did not feel it was a fair for my son to be graded on them. Finally, during his last year in school, his IEP contained Specially Designed Instruction that does not allow any grading of word searches or scrambles for him. Hopefully, as a freshman in college, we will not see these activities being used as an assessment tool.

Thanks for adding the voice of a parent of an older student with dysgraphia. I agree with your statement that the time spent poring over the word search grids could have been spent actually learning and getting excited about content! Argh. And, as a former university professor, I can say that during my 7 years on faculty, I never once saw a university professor use a word search. Hopefully your son is through with those!

As a teacher, I see the use of crossword puzzles (with a word bank) and word searches to be find vocabulary and spelling benefits for elementary students. As a parent of a middle schooler, I have been shocked at the number of these labor intensive and time consuming puzzles that have been assigned as homework to be graded and there is obvious low educational value. It have been difficult to get a biology teacher to stop sending these home when other reinforcing assignments need our child's time.

Most of my argument has been stated in the previous posts, but I would like to add my story:
Although many teachers give out word searches at some point in the year to free up a little time in their schedules, there are a handful that rely on them. Take, for example, my sixth grade teacher, Ms. Allen. She would give out a huge (I'm talking 35 by 35 character monsters that took up a whole page at 12-point font) word search every week or so. She would then come around to every table and grade them, grade something that requires no ingenuity at all, does not build any skills at all except for toning eye muscles by putting them under stress. (Training for a job entailing computers, perhaps?) So, please, if you are a teacher or plan to become one, at least assign some creative journaling assignments and spare us schoolchildren from hours of useless torture. Signed, A Rising Eighth Grader ☺ ☻ ♥ ♪ ♫ ☼

I think word searches can be useful for word bank building. If the word study is focusing on long a spelled with ai, then looking up the words with the ai spelling is a good review. Also, if the students are studying nouns, it is a good way for students to be exposed to a variety of nouns so that they can get more examples of nouns. It is a good supplementary resource if used in the proper context of exposure to words. Tools teachers use should be judged on how they are used by the teacher and not be written off because of the way some teachers misuse them.

I believe word searches are useful to help students build stamina and help with learning to key in on details. Testing is a game of stamina and attention to detail. I use it to help my students learn that you look everywhere to help find information. I would never use it as a grade because I feel their is no benefit to the word search in this manner. ADHD students learn to slow down when working using word searches, as long as it is not to complicated.