Chemistry PIT: An Engaging Trading Card Game
Are you looking for an engaging game to use in your high school chemistry class? PIT is a trading card game that focuses on categorizing content, with students trading cards until they get a complete set of cards that match. This allows students to make connections and practice content in a fun game format. You can use PIT for a variety of chemistry content.
In this post, I’m going to explain how to create a set of cards for a chemistry PIT card game, as well as explain how to play PIT in your chemistry class.
Creating Categories for the Game
PIT will work best with four or five categories. In the image above, you can see that there are five categories for VSEPR shapes and bond angles. I chose linear, bent, trigonal planar, trigonal pyramidal, and tetrahedral as the five categories for this VSEPR PIT trading card game.
After you decide on the categories, you need to come up with the cards that will be included in each of those categories. I recommend having somewhere between 5-6 cards in each category. If you choose five cards, you should have five cards for each category. In other words, make sure each category has an equal number of cards.
For this VSEPR set, I decided my cards would include the following for each category:
bond angle
Electron Domain (AXE)
Picture of the 3-dimensional shape
two Lewis Structures that would give a certain shape
This set therefore includes five cards for each of the five categories.
Print and Laminate the Cards
Once you have the cards created, print the cards out and laminate them for future use.
How to Play PIT
Step 1: Separate the Students into Groups
Students need to be separated into groups. Separate the students into as many groups as you have categories. So if you have four categories, separate your students into four groups. If you have five categories, separate your students into five groups. I usually have my students line up and then count off by fours or fives. I might have them line up in order of shortest to tallest, or smallest address to largest address, etc. Once the students have a number, I have the groups separate into various “corners” of the room around a central trading table.
Step 2: Shuffle the Cards and Distribute to Groups
Shuffle all of the cards so that they are mixed up. Then deal them out into groups. If you have four groups, deal the cards out for the four groups. If you have five groups. deal the cards out for the five groups. Deliver the cards for each group to their table or area. I tell students that they should look at their cards, but that they should try to do it in a way that other groups cannot see the cards.
Step 3: Explaining the Rules and Beginning Play
I write the categories on the board so that students know what categories are in play. In this case, I would write linear, bent, trigonal planar, trigonal pyramidal, and tetrahedral on the board. I explain to the students that the goal of the game is to get all of the cards in one category. So the students could attempt to get all of the linear cards, all of the bent cards, and so on and so forth. Which category they decide to go for will depend on the cards in their stack. For example, if they have 2/5 cards that are linear, and the rest are other categories, they probably should try to collect all the linear cards.
From here, I designate a “trader.” I do this by saying the student with the longest hair, the student with the biggest shoe size, etc. Once the trader is determined, the team will decide which cards they want to trade. The trader may trade up to 2 cards at a time. They should come to the trading table with 1 or 2 cards. I encourage my kids to get really into it, and shout “two, two, two” if they want to trade two cards, and similarly for one. The trader should find someone at the trading table to trade with. I tell my students to trade blindly (i.e. don’t show each other the cards you are trading with each other). Once they trade, the traders should return to their group. The group will look over the new cards and determine if any of the new cards match the category they are going for. If they do, they would add those cards to their collection. If not, they can continue trading. The same trader goes back to the trading table to trade again.
Play continues until a group believes they have all cards for the category they are trying to collect. I have a bell at the trading table, and when they think they have won, they come up to the trading table and ring the bell. I check the set, and if all cards fit, then that team wins the round. I would collect all the cards, reshuffle, and we would play again. If a card is incorrect and doesn’t fit the category, play would resume.
Adding in the “Stinky Chemist.”
After a few rounds of PIT, I make the last round or two more interesting with the addition of the “Stinky Chemist.” Each group will need an additional card. In our example, I would have five additional cards added to the rest of the cards-four that are a “Super Chemist” and one that is a “Stinky Chemist.” Groups will now have 6 total cards instead of 5. A group still needs to get all the cards in a category. For example, they would still need to get all five cards that fit the linear category. They will have one extra card. That extra card can be a card from another category, or it can be a “Super Chemist.” However, it cannot be the “Stinky Chemist.” Even if the group has all cards in the category, and they have the “Stinky Chemist,” they cannot win. The “Stinky Chemist” is like an “Old Maid.” The extra cards, the “Stinky Chemist” and the “Super Chemist,” are not wild cards. They cannot take the place of a card from a category.
If you don’t have time to make your own sets, I have PIT games available in my TPT store, with more sets to come. Click the button to be taken to all PIT games currently in my TPT store.
Thanks for reading! Let me know on Instagram if you use PIT and how it goes with your students! I hope you found this helpful. Happy teaching!
