Cooperative Games Learning to Cooperate Through Play
Rooted in research and guided by heart, Cooperative Games are playful experiences of kindness, joy, and collaboration that bring us together.
Cooperative games build community, nurture relationships, reduce aggression, teach social skills, and spread joy.
Here’s what that looks like:
Play without Pressure:
Cooperative games replace competition with carefree cooperative challenges. Players work together and help each other, which alleviates social anxiety and builds trust.
Belonging for All:
No one is ever eliminated in a cooperative game. Goals, decisions, and resources are shared. Everyone is included and everyone belongs.
Building Social Bonds:
Cooperative games are fun—and so much more! When we have fun in a spirit of cooperation, barriers between us break down. We are no longer rivals, but friends.
Play
Bring Cooperative Play Into Your Home or Classroom
The Baby Beluga Game
Inspired by Raffi’s beloved song, and created by us in collaboration with Raffi, The Baby Beluga Game is an award-winning game that invites children to work together to help Baby Beluga and friends swim safely home.
With wooden game pieces, beautiful watercolor art, and cooperative play for all ages, this is a fun and appealing way to teach cooperation, environmental science, and care for the natural world. Eco-friendly, fair trade, and made by us in the U.S.A.
The Cooperative Games Classroom Kit
The Cooperative Games Classroom Kit provides everything you need to bring social-emotional learning to life in a fun way accessible to all students Pre-K—3.
Our program is based on specific university research. It includes all the active games and board games shown to increase kindness and decrease aggression in young children in a University of Nevada study. In addition, the program includes The Baby Beluga Game and our book on using cooperative games for social-emotional learning. All together, it provides a wealth of options for starting a cooperative games practice of your own.
This program is our creation and this is the only place you can buy it. Affordable too!
Fun and Free Games for Everyone
Explore a growing library of free cooperative games for kids, families, and classrooms. These easy-to-learn activities spark laughter, build trust, and remind us how much we love to play.
Learn
Discover the Research and Wisdom Behind Cooperative Play
The First Truly Comprehensive Resource for Educators on Cooperative Games!
This useful manual gives the why and how-to of using cooperative games in education. Written and illustrated by Suzanne Lyons, with a Foreword by Alfie Kohn. Published in 2022 by Teachers College Press, Columbia University.
Cooperative Games in Education
The Cooperative Games Bullying Prevention Program
Winner 2017 Skipping Stones Multicultural Magazine Book Award for Best Teaching Resource!
This fun and informative book for teachers and parents shows how to use cooperative games to prevent bullying and promote kindness in young children. It gives detailed instructions on how to use specific research-tested active games and board games that teach skills and cultivate a classroom climate where bullying is unlikely to take root. Written and illustrated by Suzanne Lyons.
eBook: Cooperative Play, The Antidote to Excess Competition
An improtant little book on a rarely discussed topic: competition
This richly illustrated eBook brings the reader on a journey to discover the little-discussed pitfalls of excess competition and its many harmful social effects. Through stories, revealing research recaps, humorous illustrations, and personal anecdotes, author Suzanne Lyons helps us see how the race to be best can hold us back and bring us down. What’s the antidote to excess competition? Read this entertaining book to find out!
Teach
Cooperative games are a teacher’s dream: they are easy to implement, inexpensive or free, and accessible to students of all ages, ability levels, and backgrounds. Still, there are best practices to know for maximum benefits. In addition, cooperative games can be used for many different educational purposes, and there are different strategies for each of them. Our professional development services are personally provided by Suzanne Lyons, experienced cooperative games trainer and founder of this site.
Professional Development
Rooted in Play
Inspire
See How Our Work with Cooperative Games is Making a Difference
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A week-long professional development institute for TK-Grade 12 educators in a Sacramento, California school district. Working in conjunction with Sacramento State University colleagues and teacher scholars to devise strategies for using cooperative games to build community, nurture social skills, teach academic subjects, and foster civic engagement.
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A 3-hour workshop for Montessori teachers at a Montessori School in Eureka, California. Educators learned about cooperative games through discussion and active play. Further, they discovered the close alignment between cooperative play and games with the Montesssori method.
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Recurring lectures introduce students to cooperative games at a Peace and Justice Studies class in the Religious Studies department at Cal Poly University. Students learn about the close relationship between peace and cooperation and find out, through play and lecture, how cooperative games make good use of our inherent love of cooperation.
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Suzanne’s webinar “Let’s Play! Cooperative Games in Early Childhood Education” introduced teachers, care givers, and school administrators to the reasons that cooperative play is developmentally important and enormously engaging to children in pre-K settings. Over 4,000 sign-ups and more than 1,000 attendees! Sponsored by Early Childhood Investigations
Interested in a Workshop, Webinar or Consultation?
Cooperative Games, a Multi-Use Teaching Tool
Case Studies
Here are some of our case studies:
· Cooperative Games for Civic Engagement and Democratic Skills: A TK – Grade 12 Initiative at a Sacramento School District
· Cooperative Games for Teaching Math, A Grant-Funded Study into Pedagogy and Methods
· Cooperative Games for Peace Studies: Lectures at Cal Poly Humboldt University
· Cooperative Games for Bullying Prevention: Inquiry into the Effectiveness of a Particular Set of Games
· Cooperative Games and Montessori Education: Alignment Between Cooperative Play and the Montessori Method
· Cooperative Games and Environmental Education: Pedagogical Rationale and Curriculum Design
together we play
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together we thrive
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together we play ~ together we thrive ~
Meet Suzanne Lyons
Suzanne Lyons is a former science teacher, educational researcher, author of over 30 books, and the founder of CooperativeGames.com. She is passionate about science education as well as social-emotional learning. A firm believer in the power of fun, and the need to embrace the whole student, Suzanne discovered cooperative games in 2009—before they were widely known in the U.S. She has had the pleasure of helping promote the concept and watching it grow in popularity since then.
Suzanne is an expert in the educational value of and uses for cooperative games. Her book Cooperative Games in Education, Building Community Without Competition Pre-K—12 is the first to provide a thorough discussion of the amazing pedagogical theory, deep roots, and joyous practice of “playing with each other—not against each other.”
Currently, Suzanne enjoys communicating with the public through this website. She writes the content and does most of the illustrations. Suzanne also speaks at conferences, lectures at Universities, presents at festivals, mentors other cooperative-game enthusiasts, and provides professional development to teachers.