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ACTIVITY
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DESCRIPTION
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1.
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Good manners
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This is a simple
introductory activity to get across the idea of manners, both good and bad.
Draw the table on the board
and give students a few ideas to get them going.
Then they should fill their
table with as many examples of good and bad manners as they can think of.
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2.
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Spending committee
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This is a group activity where students imagine they are going to be
part of the committee that will decide how money is spent in their school or
at home
They
should discuss the advantages and disadvantages of a list of possible new
resources for their school/home and try to come to a decision about the
importance of the items.
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3.
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The press conference
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Tell students that they have got the job of reporter for a magazine
about famous people. They are going to interview some famous people and they
need to prepare some general questions they can ask any famous person -
actors, singers, sports stars, politicians etc.
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4.
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Fashion statements
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This is a staged discussion activity which focuses on students'
personal opinions of style and fashion.
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5.
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The soap opera
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In this activity students create a profile for a group of people and
imagine their relationships to each other. They then construct a soap opera
based around the characters and write a scene from the soap opera.
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6.
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One word story
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This
activity is extremely simple. Each student adds a word to create a group
story.
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7.
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The new student role-play
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This is a role-play activity in which your students practise asking
for and giving personal details and directions.
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8.
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Telephone role plays
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Speaking English on the telephone is difficult for learners for many
reasons and even high-level students often feel uncomfortable with the unpredictability
of telephone conversations.
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9.
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The cooking test
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This is a writing and speaking
activity that is a lot of fun for students. It helps them to practise food
and cooking-related vocabulary as well as how to give instructions.
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10.
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Story in a bag
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Before class, the teacher
fills paper bags with 5-6 random objects. You'll need one bag per group of
four students. To make this activity interesting, the objects should be
diverse and unrelated to each other.
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11.
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Picture dictation
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First of
all explain to the students that they are going to do a picture dictation,
that you are going to describe a picture to them and that all they have to do
is simply listen and draw what they hear you describe.
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12.
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Family tree
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giving 10 minutes each to
tell and ask about a particular member in their family, e.g. grandparents,
aunts, cousins, siblings etc.
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13
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True / False stories
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Tell the
students an interesting story about yourself and describe in detail what
happened. At the end of the story, give them an opportunity to ask you
questions about the story. Finally, ask them to decide if they think the
story is true or false. (This must be the first point at which you indicate
it may not be true). Of course the story was untrue and now it's the
students' turn to make up stories.
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14
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Why didn't you come to the party?
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This speaking activity for
higher-level beginners up to upper intermediate involves students working in
pairs to make up excuses.Ask students if they've ever
had parties. If they have, tell them to share experiences with the class. If
they haven't, explain to them what a party is.
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15
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The holiday maze
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This is a reading and speaking
activity. Students make decisions in pairs or groups with the aim of going on
a successful holiday. It is based on a 'maze' principle, which gives students
different options and a variety of different holiday outcomes.
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Set the
context for your students. The students are going on holiday together and
want to have the best time possible. You can set the context by describing
the situation, telling an anecdote, showing a picture or posing some
discussion questions. I find that students love to talk about their
experiences - ask them about times they have been on holidays with friends.
Get them to talk about problems they had and things they enjoyed.
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16
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Shop service role-play
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A role-play in which your students
practise making complaints and dealing with people in a shop.This is a lively
role-play in which one student is a customer returning goods to a shop and
the other student is a shop assistant. Each student has a role card with the
information they need to give or find out from their partner, and the answers
that they will give their partner. There are two versions of the customer
role card so that the role-play can be repeated using different information.
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17
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Story telling grid
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First of
all draw a grid on the board and then put one word in each box. You can make
your story grid any size you want but the bigger the grid is the more
complicated the activity will become.
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Explain
to the students that the aim of the activity is to create a story using all
the words in the story grid. Students can use any vocabulary or grammar they
want to but they have to include all the words in the story grid.
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18
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Discussion wheels
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Discussion wheels are a good way of
giving students time to think and formulate opinions before they do
discussion work.To create a discussion wheel you simply need 8 or 10
contentious sentences based around a theme which you would like the students
to discuss.
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19
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The crime scene
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This is an activity that I've used
with students of all levels to practise their ability to describe people and
events and to produce questions.You should split the class into two groups
and tell one half that they are going to be the police and they are going to
interview the witness to a crime. Their task is to work together with the
other police and prepare questions that they will ask the witness
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20
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Chain story telling
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In this speaking activity the
students tell personal stories which are prompted by pictures.Cut up cards of
different objects, activities, animals, etc. selected randomly.Place the
cards scattered on the floor in the middle of the classroom.Tell the students
to pick up a card from the floor which they think makes them remember one of
the following:
(a) a memorable event in their lives
(b) a positive or negative past or recent experience or
(c) a story about a friend/family member/acquaintance/etc that they would
like to share with others.
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21
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Task-based speaking
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Tell them that they are going to
plan a class night out and give them a few minutes to think it over.Students
do the task in twos and plan the night. Match them with another pair to
discuss their ideas and any similarities and differences.
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22
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Jigsaw puzzle challenge
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Take 3-4 large pictures/photos and
stick them on card. Pictures can come from Sunday supplements, travel
brochures, calendars, magazine adverts etc. Pictures specific to students’
interests will motivate them e.g. film stills, cartoons, news stories, famous
paintings, famous people.
Draw puzzle shapes on the back of
each picture (4-5 shapes) and cut out the picture pieces.Give each student in
the class a jigsaw piece. They must not show their piece to anyone.Students
then mingle and question each other about what is on their puzzle piece to
try and find people with pieces of the same jigsaw.
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23
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Create a biography
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Take a
biography of a famous person and write each detail on strips of paper.Keep
the identity secret so they have to guess, if appropriate.Draw a table on the
board for students to copy and make notes e.g. place of birth, early years,
famous for.Give out the strips (split the class in two if large and give out
2 sets).Students mingle and ask each other questions until they have as many
details as possible about the person.Take away the strips and put students in
pairs or small groups to use their table of notes to write the biography
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24
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Improving discussion lessons
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Make a
list of issues or topics which your students might find interesting. Think of
seven or eight statements on each issue which represent typical and widely
opposing comments on the topic. For example:
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Topic:
Are boys and girls the same?
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Girls
naturally want to play with dolls.
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Boys are
usually better at science subjects than girls.
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25
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Improvisations
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Use a
video with sound off. Select scenes from a favourite show or film e.g.
Friends. Students are assigned roles and act out what they think is taking
place.Use a piece of realia: a real object to spark conversation e.g. a train
timetable, a bit of English currency and a list of exchange rates, a hat or
outfit, a musical instrument, a mobile phone, a menu (students must
incorporate these objects as part of their invented dialogue).
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26
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Superlative questions
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This activity practises the
superlatives in questions, and generates a great deal of student speaking. It
is a highly personalised activity, asking the students to talk about their
own experiences and opinions.Prepare individual questions on slips of paper.
The questions should all use the superlative form. For example,
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What's
the most interesting country you have been to?
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What
subject are/were you worst at school?
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What is
the tallest building you have been in?
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Who is
the strangest person you have met?
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What is
the greatest problem in the world today?
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27
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Interview the Experts
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Three students sit in a line at the
front of the class. They are the experts, but they don't know what they are
experts about. The rest of the class choose the area of expertise - e.g.
cooking, car maintenance, trees.The other students then ask the experts
questions and the experts answer them.
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28
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'Tap-In Debate'
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Basically, you need a
controversial topic to start. Once you have established a controversial
topic, divide your students into two groups; those who agree with the
statement and those who disagree. They now prepare their arguments. Once you
have done this, arrange your chairs so that there are two hot seats facing
each other and then place chairs behind each of the two hot seats (enough for
all of your students).
The idea is that two students
start the topic of conversation, trying to defend their group's point of
view. Once started, you then tap any two students on their shoulders during
the conversation (Always one who is in a hot seat and one who isn't) Once
they have been tapped on the shoulder they MUST stop the conversation and two
new students must resume it exactly where the other two left it, even if this
is in mid sentence (they change places with the person in the hot seat). They
must make it coherent and follow the previous opinions and statements! They
must continue the sentence of the previous speaker exactly where the previous
student in the hot seat left it!
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29
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Third conditional guessing game
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Ask a student, a volunteer
hopefully, to leave the room. While that person is out of the room you and
the rest of the class decide on something very unusual that could have
happened while they were out of the room. A good example is two students get
married, the OHP explodes, basically whatever the students can suggest.Then,
the person who has left the room comes back in and asks each student in turn
only one question and the full question is 'What would you have done if this
had happened?'
And each student in turn answers in a full sentence for example, 'If this had
happened, I would have bought some flowers'.Now, they mustn't mention the
names of anyone involved because at the end the student who is guessing has
to work out what happened to whom and, if they can't, you can go round again
with new answers
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30
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Running Dictation
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This is a lively activity that
practises speaking, listening, writing, walking and remembering!Choose a
short passage or dialogue and make several copies. Put the copies up around
the walls of the classroom (or even the school building).Put the students in
pairs or small groups. The aim is for one of the students in each pair to
walk (or run!) to read the passage on the wall. They remember some of the
passage and walk (or run!) back to their partner. They quietly dictate what
they remembered to their partner, who writes it down. They then swap roles.
Over several turns they will build the whole passage. This means they really
do have to run back and forth because students will only remember three or four
words at a time.The winning pair is the team that finishes first - although
you need to check for mistakes. If there are mistakes, they must keep walking
to check!
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