The Crosshare autofiller can help this along by showing you different candidate fills - every time you press the ‘Enter’ key (or click ‘Rerun Autofill’ in the top bar) you’ll get a slightly different fill. The best thing to do is to try to stay flexible and keep playing with different options until it all clicks. Maybe you really want to work a specific word in but every time you try it makes for poor (or no!) choices elsewhere. It can take a lot of tweaking to get a grid that you’re happy with. This nytimes article does a pretty good job of introducing some of the ideas behind where they should go.

Placing black squares is an art form for larger grids. Select the square and hit ‘.’ or type any letter to toggle it back. You can create a black square by typing the ‘.’ key on your keyboard or hitting the all black key on the keyboard if you’re on a mobile device. You can also use any other word you like even if it’s not in the list - it’s all COVFEFE. You shouldn’t rely exclusively on the autofiller - the wordlist(s) beside the grid give you other options for the currently selected entry. As you type you’ll notice the Crosshare autofiller magically fills in the rest of the grid. Filling the gridĪfter launching the constructor, click anywhere in the grid and start typing your first fill entry. Mini puzzles are a great way to get started because you don’t need to worry so much about the grid layout - you just need to focus on getting fill you like and coming up with fun clues. When you first launch the constructor, Crosshare defaults you to a 5x5 mini grid (to create a different sized puzzle click on “More” in the top bar and then click “New Puzzle”). She writes regularly about the use of educational technology in K-12 classrooms.Don’t be intimidated! Constructing great crosswords takes a lot of practice, but it’s easy to get started.

So, let us know in the Comments section what we should take a look at and we'll throw 'em into the hopper.Ĭarolina Fransen is the EdTech Apps and Tools Editor at. Have we missed something that we should feature here? Most certainly. We've been doing this for over 30 years and have, in that time, developed a sense for what's good and bad. So, how do we sort through all of those to feature the ones which are most useful and interesting? Well… we start by sorting through thousands of these things… then we talk to the presenters in the SimpleK12 Teacher Learning Community and watch their videos closely… then we talk to many of the members in the Teacher Learning Community, teachers just like you who are using these apps and tools day in and day out. Yup, there are thousands of apps, tools, services, websites, and other offerings - many free - designed for teachers and students. How We Decide Which Free Tech Tools to Feature These puzzles can be great for vocabulary lessons, holiday activities, or even exam reviews. Crossword Puzzle Maker will save all your own puzzles as well. A collection of almost 100 of their best puzzles in a wide variety of topics is also available to be solved on the computer, or to be printed out and solved. Simply type in your puzzle name, your vocabulary list, a few other items, and voila, you have a puzzle. Fun Ways to Learn with Crossword Puzzle Makerġ01 Days of Free Tech for Teachers, Day 27Ĭreate your own crossword puzzle in minutes with Crossword Puzzle Maker.

Crossword puzzle maker app