GAMES AND PRACTICE ACTIVITIES

Some ideas for games and practice activities

DRILLS AND VOCABULARY GAMES

1 Where’s the frog?

• One student closes his/her eyes. 
• An animal or object is hidden in the classroom. 
• The student who hasn’t seen where has to find it. 
• The other students repeat “Where is the …?”, very quietly.
•  If the student who is looking for it is far away, and louder and louder as they get nearer.

 2.Say it Three times

• Everyone in the class has a flashcard.
• Students sit in a circle so that everyone can see their card.
• If there is not enough vocabulary for everyone in the classroom to have a different word, work in smaller groups.
• One person says one of the words quickly, three times and the person holding that card must say it once before the other person finishes.
• If the first person says it three times before the other says it once, then they continue saying more words in the same way. If the second person says the word before the first has said it three times, then they take over and say a word three times.

 3. I bet I know.

• Put a series of flashcards from a lexical set that the students are familiar with, face down on the blackboard. 
• The students must guess what they think is there, and then get one point for each correct answer. (There’s a …./there are some…)

 4 Guess what I’m thinking

• One student thinks of five words from a lexical set. 
• His/her partner must guess which words he/she is thinking. 
• They have ten guesses.

 5 Happy families

This is a traditional card game, which the students can make themselves and then play. It practises “Have you got…?”/Yes, I have/No, I haven’t and the natural language used to play games. 
6. The weather map

• Students draw simple symbols for the weather on a map.
•  They must guess the weather on their partner’s map.(A bit like “battleships”)

 7. Picasso dictation

• One student has a simple line drawing which he/she must describe to another student, who draws the picture. 
• Practises there is/there are, prepositions, comparatives etc.

 8. Spot the difference.

• In pairs, the students have very similar pictures, with some small differences. 
• They must discover what differences there are without looking at each others pictures.

 9. The unfinished crossword.

• In pairs, each student has half the answers of a crossword, and their partner the other half. 
• They must complete the crossword without looking at their partner’s copy.

 10. TIC TAC TOE (Noughts and crosses)

• Put nine flashcards face down on the B/B and number them 1-9
• Organise the classs into two teams and each team takes it in turn to say a number and name the object on the flashcard/spell the word/say the opposite/say another word related to it.

Adaptions : Opposites, make a sentence with the word, past form of the verb, definitions and find the word.

 11. The Pools

• Put all the flashcards from a lexical set the students have recently learnt, face down on the board.
•  Miss out one or two. 
• Students write number 1  to – the number of cards you have stuck on the board in their notebooks
• They guess what each number is, writing the name of something next to each number. 
• When all students have written a word next to each number you (very theatrically) show the cards, one by one. 
• Students get one point if they have that card somewhere in their list and two points if the number coincides.

 12. Can I have a banana (please)

• All students have a set of vocabulary cards (the typical ones from the back of the book).
• Allocate ten points to each student.
• The teacher says “Can I have a ……….,please” and all students show that card. They lose a point if they show the wrong card, or if the teacher doesn’t say “please”and they still show a card.

AN ADAPTION OF THIS GAME IS FOR THE TEACHER TO SHOW A FLASHCARD AND SAY A WORD, THE CHILDREN STAND UP IF IT IS CORRECT AND DON’T MOVE IF IT IS INCORRECT. THIS CAN BE DONE WITH A STRING ON THE FLOOR, OR RUN FROM ONE SIDE OF THE ROOM TO THE OTHER.

 13. Chicken, fish ,sweets

• All students have a set of vocabulary cards
• The teacher says a sequence of three words and the students have to order them in the same order ie: cake, apple, banana.
• The teacher hands over to a student who does the same and then students work in pairs.

 14.  Musical flashcards

•      Play with whole class.
•       Students sit in a circle and pass around the flashcards
•       The teacher puts on music and stops with out warning.
•       The children say what is on the card they are holding at that time.

 15. Vocabulary card bingo

•        Play with whole class. 
•        Each child has a set of vocabulary cards. 
•        They chose 4-6 cards (from a set of eight )and lay them face up on the desk.
•       The teacher calls words out in random order (keeping a record of words ) 
•       Children turn cards over as they hear the words
•        They shout BINGO! When all their cards are turned over.

 16. Run to the word.

• The flashcards are stuck around the room.
• Teachers says Run/walk/skip/hop/jump/swim etc. to the …..(name of the object on the flashcard).
• This is a bit boisterous, so you can do the same by just pointing – but it’s not as much fun!!!

17. Run to the board

• Divide the class in to two teams(Sitting along the front row on the desks is a good set-up, or alternatively in two rows, perpendicular to the board)
• Give each team a name and a piece of chalk/board pen
• Establish what the children will have to write/draw/touch on the board.
• Number the children  in each team, so that you have one of the same number in each team.
• The teacher says the number and a word (ie: triangle/big triangle/fifty six/ 16 or 60
• The two pupils with the number run up to the board and write/draw/touch whatever the teacher has said.
• The first child to do this correctly gets a point for their team.

Adaption of the same activity - a follow up to the animal alphabet game

• write one complete alphabet for each team on the board
• Each child runs to the board and add one animal next to a letter (ie. monkey next to the "m"

18.Chair game
Students sit in a circle on chairs. Teacher stands in the middle of the circle and says a colour. All students who have something that colour on their person, have to move chairs. The teacher sits down quick so that a student is left in the middle - who then has to say a colour.
Adaptions: instead of a colour - 

1. an item of clothing (Change if you are wearing trainers)
2. More complex -  "Change chairs if you like........../If you went to........at the weekend/If you have been to .................

19. Stand up, sit down

• The teacher shows a flashcard and ssays a word or "This is a ....."
• If the teacher is correct, the children stand up.
•  if the teacher is wrong the children sit down.

Adaption 

• the students take the teacher's part
• instead of standing up or sitting down they can touch their noses 
• or put up their hands or show a card saying true or false.
• or jump to one side of a rope on the floor
• or run to one side of the classroom
• the same as above, but instead of showing a flashcard, the teacher makes a statement (o likes fish/I can play football/It's raining)

20. Pictionary

• The teacher draws an object or a situation and the class have to guess ie: a monkey/you wne to the cinema
• after a couple of examples the teacher hands over to the pupils, who then come up one by one to the board, and the others have to guess

Adaptions

• Teams - instead of puoils guessing individually, they can gain pints for their team
• Groups - the class is divided into two or three teams. The teacher prepares five things for each team to draw (drawings or words). The first person in each team goes up to the teacher and reads/looks at the word or picture. They go back to their group and draw. As the team guesses the drawing the next person runs up to the teacher and reads/looks at another thing to draw, runs back to the group, draws etc. etc.

Football hangman
This is very popular with Upper Primary boys !! Although everyone finds it fun.

• Look for a good image of a football on Google images and print it out so that it is about 4-5 cms in diameter
• laminate it and cut out the ball, leaving a milimetre of plastic around the outside.
• Draw a basic hootball pitch on the board and divide each half into four vertically, making sure you draw the goals and the centre spot. The pitch should fill most of the board, leaving room for the scoreboard.
• The game

A FEW MORE CLASSICS

Pelmanism

Irregular verbs

Vocabulary

Opposites

Spelling

Prepositions

Lexical sets

Go to the market

A/an/some

Vocabulary

Kim’s game

There is/are

There was/were

PERSONALISED ACTIVITIES

Acrostics

For likes and dislikes, using your name. Your partner guesses if you like or dislike the things and then asks “Do you like…? To find out if they guessed correctly.

Can adapt for have got, past,(my weekend), adjectives, personality etc.

Four boxes activity

 I can/can’t/My partner can/can’t. Interview your partner and find at least two things for each box. Eg. I can swim but my partner can’t. My partner and I can speak French, etc. Easy to adapt this “personalised drill” for almost any tense or structure.