IMPORTANT!! PLEASE READ!!

Welcome to the new website for the ECS Scrabble Club. Make this a favorite or bookmark so you can get to it easily!  I will be putting all kinds of information up here such as morning meeting dates, Scrabble Lunch dates, school tournament information, weekly team rankings and all kind of useful material. It will be updated weekly, if not daily. It will also be linked from the school website. You need to officially "follow" this blog so you can make comments or ask questions after posts. I will try to answer them or respond quickly. Also there are helpful links at the bottom to help you get better at Scrabble quickly. The quicker you start learning and playing, the better chance you will love it and excel.

I wanted to first make sure that all the 7th and 8th graders know that they would be meeting on this Friday, 9/14 at 6:55 because of Late Start Wednesday and we will meet in Mrs. Maxwell's room from now on. Her room can hold a lot of people. 6th graders will meet on Mondays for now at 6:55 in the same room from now on.

Make sure you are memorizing the two letter words. On this Friday at Scrabble Lunch, I am going to have everybody (6th-8th) write them down from memory. You simply must know them to play the game correctly. Just start from the top...AA, AB, AD, AE, AG, etc, etc.. until you get to ZA. You already know more than half of them which leaves about 40-50. It takes about 30 minutes at the longest to learn them and some will learn them in as little as 10 minutes.

In two weeks we are going to start the actual regular season in which every game counts and records will be kept so you need to make sure you have a partner soon! Recruit someone to be your partner if you don't have one. Or find someone who is looking for a partner at Scrabble Lunch.

Scrabble Lunch will be for all 6th-8th graders from now on every Friday. Everyone is encouraged to come but not required to. There will be pizza available for 1 dollar per slice.  You need to pay Coach Porter in advance outside at activity period.  There will be a sheet to indicate how many slices you bought and whether cheese, pepperoni, or sausage.  This will help make sure we get the right amount. Soft drinks will be included with the pizza for no extra charge. If you don't want to eat pizza, you need to sack your own lunch as there will not be time to go to the cafeteria.  We will always meet in Coach Teed's room.

Also, everyone needs to make an ISC account (Internet Scrabble Club). The link for the site is on the right on the blog. Just download it for Mac or Windows and then you can post what your username, or "handle" as it is called on ISC on the blog under comments. Then you can start playing each other.

Also, there is a link to purchase a great book that can be used to quickly amass an awesome Scrabble vocabulary that will overwhelm your opponent. I highly recommend purchasing it if you are wanting to get good.

Lastly, I am going to start having crash course tutoring session for those that want to get better fast from 3:00-4:00 on Thursdays in Coach Rose's room. I can almost assure you that those that attend this session will quickly start dominating the game within a month. The students that learn the strategies fastest are the ones that usually are in the hunt to go to the National Tournament and compete for the 10, 000 dollar grand prize.  I am only asking those that come to pay a small 5 dollar fee per session, which in turn will be used to purchase more Scrabble equipment for our growing club. (50 people currently are active in the club in middle school)

This will be a fun year and for many, this club will become one of the highlights of your school week!  I want to use this blog as the main communication tool for everything Scrabble.  So check in often! I will have candy contests on this blog to see who can find the best play on Scrabble images I post here so don't let someone beat you to the best play!!!

Coach Porter