The process of developing Word Wrangler was also leveraged as an opportunity to explore the usage of AI Tools as a co-creator in the coding process.

Initial ideas were first sketched out and planned starting with the target goal of the game— practicing targeted short vowel identification.

The primary interaction modality of this game is on touch screen devices, though it can be used on mouse/trackpad devices.

The game allows for the targeting of each short vowel at two difficulty levels. The standard difficulty has students identify words containing the short vowel sound among a mixture of words containing other vowel sounds. The hard mode has students also identifying the targeted short vowel sound, but the words populating the rounds all contain the same vowel in both the long and short forms.

The game was also designed to incorporate movement when played on a large SMARTBoard screen (or similar). With the southwestern theme to the game, the first round presents the words upon trotting buffalo. The second round has the words flying across the screen on vultures. The final round combines the two, having students coordinating movement to tap the animals from both areas of the screen.

Over time playing the game, the students began identifying strategies for success that translated into their core phonics lesson components. For example, students in the hard mode began quickly identifying that the long vowel words tended to end with /e/. The students also enjoying the physical aspect of tapping to playing the game on a large interactive screen.