Timberdoodle 4th Grade Teaches Strategy and Logic with Quixo

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As the kids get older we are finding ourselves to be a gaming family.  Last year we worked as a team to test and build Shape Farm during a local board game competition.  After a recent masterclass in the Learner’s Lab I really learned how to pick good games for our family and have started working to build our game closet to contain games we want to play and not just party games for when we have a big group, which isn’t often.  

I learned that we need to find more games for 2-4 players, games that don’t require our whole family to play.  Quixo is this type of game, which made it a great fit when I was offered a chance to review a copy as part of the Timberdoodle Blog Team. Quixo is part of the critical thinking activities in the TImberdoodle 4th grade curriculum kit.  

Timberdoodle 4th grade teaches Logic and Strategy with games!

Initially the Quixo board game looks like a giant tic-Tac-Toe game with a Five by five grid of blocks with Xs and Os.  But the game is surprisingly more complex and challenging.  The game pieces consist of a wooden game board and 25 square blocks, each with 4-blank sides and 2 sides with X and O on them.  

The blocks themselves are nice and big so they won’t get lost easily and are safe for the youngest sibling. The blocks come with a carrying bag in the packaging but we were quick to abandon it since the blocks could just be dumped in the box loose.  

We took Quixo with us camping the first time we played it and didn’t have to worry about losing any of the blocks. Quixo moves quickly and depending on the skill level of the players a game can be very short, usually 10-15 minutes, making it a great family game that people can easily swap out for each round, without taking up the whole afternoon.  For our Outside the Box kids with short attention spans this is also a plus.  

How to Play the Quixo Board Game

On your turn you choose a blank Quixo block or one of your own to take off the board and place at the end of any of the rows that can now slide, thus moving other blocks in that row to new places on the board.  It sounds simple enough until someone has 4 blocks in a row and you have to decide how to stop them from adding the fifth block to win.  Unlike Tic-Tac-Toe it doesn’t work to just put your own block in the fifth space, because it can be moved later for them to win. Now you see where you need strategy.  

For my perfectionist children who have experience with strategy games, there was some initial frustration as the game took longer and they saw their strategy rebuffed each round.  As all the pieces on the board are claimed by one player or the other, the strategy changes as you move your pieces around to make a row.  Quixo was a challenge for our 4th grader.  I’m sure as we continue to play it throughout the year he will pick up more strategy.   The 8th grader was the first to beat their dad and took to the game more quickly.  

Using Quixo with Outside the Box Kids

I love that the Quixo block are large and easy to hold.  I also like that the game is very tactile.  When a player moves a black the whole board moves and they can see the consequences of their choice on the other block’s placement immediately.  This helps them understand the cause and reaction of their choices.  

Since this can be a short two person game, it offers excellent opportunities to go slow as you play and talk through each move with the student to help them develop and play with strategy.  Outside the Box kids often need extra time to pick up on strategy moves and learn the best moves to make.  The short game length means you can take your time playing and talking through it without committing to an entire afternoon.