Give each group of students some card board strips of paper. Also some tape. 

Students brainstorm the names of all things in the classroom (in English!). 

Then, ask them to go tape the names up around the classroom. First come, first server.

After, take up the names. Student will learn the words over time, as they see them in class and use them. 

Next: why not give each group a chart sized piece of paper and get them to make a month calendar. Put everyone’s birthday’s on it and use it throughout the year! 

This post was submitted by James.

Ask students to think of a word they’ve learned previously. They have to make sure they know how to write it.

Students come to the front of the class and write the word in the air using his index finger. Then, students write down they word and say it out loud. The student who wrote the word in the air gets 1 point for each player who got the word right and the players who get it right get 1 point too. 

This post was submitted by Ana Maria Menezes.

This video is superb! It has verbs linked to nouns in categories (Play / Blow etc… see the worksheet).

Watch the video first and see if students can find the verbs that are shown in context.

Next, watch again and have them complete the worksheet.

Finally – watch a third time, pausing the video and taking up the answers for each verb.

You might get Ss to brainstorm afterwards all the collocations for some popular verbs (get / make / cut / do etc…).

Handout

Answer Key

This post was submitted by David .

Divide class in two teams, A and B. Divide the board in the middle. Mark each side of the board for each team.  

On each side of the board draw:

• a river with stepping stones for students to get across the river. The winner is the team that crosses the river first. For every correct word they write, mark a stepping stone.
• a ladder. The winner is the team that climbs the ladder first. For every correct word they write, mark a step on the ladder.
• a mountain with climbing points for the teams  to climb and put their country’s flag up on the top. The winner is the team that climbs the mountain and puts their country’s flag up first. For every correct word they write, mark a climbing point.
• an apple tree with a ladder which the students have to climb and pick the apples from the tree. This is suggested for longer spelling and vocabulary homework since the students first have to climb up the ladder and then pick the apples. The winner is the team that picks all the apples first. For every correct word they write, mark a step on the ladder and then an apple on the tree.
• a daisy. The winner is the team whose daisy is wiped out first. For every correct word they write, wipe out a petal and after all the petals have been wiped out, then wipe out the leaves and the stem until the whole daisy has gone.
• an ice cream with 4-5 scoops of different flavours. For example, brown for chocolate, green for pistachio, red for strawberry, white for vanilla, etc. The winner is the team that eats their ice cream first, the whole of it, even the cone. For every correct word they write, wipe out a scoop until the whole ice cream has gone!
• a basket with basketballs underneath. The winner is the team that puts all their basketballs in the basket first. For every correct word they write, wipe out a basketball. 

Call a member from each team up on the board and dictate a word from their vocabulary to them. The students write the word they hear on their side of the board making sure at the same time that the student from the opposite team cannot see what the other student is writing. So cheating is eliminated.
This has proven a very nice and exciting way to check spelling, listening comprehension and pronunciation in a fun way. It also adds a lot of variety in my spelling and vocabulary games while my students’ motivation to learn English is enhanced. My students love it and look forward to their spelling game every time.
One final tip: In case of a draw, I treat the whole class to cookies, lollipops, or chocolates! 

This post was submitted by Barbara Koziori.

The Six Steps:

1. Look at the word

2. Hear the word

3. Say the word

4. Spell the word

5. Write the word

6. Find the word

Here is how I use Six Steps:

1. Write the word on the board, have students point to it

2. Students cup their ears with their hands, you say the word

3. The students say the word back to you

4. Students spell the word outloud

5. On a small slip of paper, the students write the word

6. Hand out a summary of the story/article that the vocabulary applies to that you will be reading in class. Students are to use a highlighter to scan the sheet for the word.

7. Erase the word then write the next word on the board and repeat the cycle.

My students love this activity because it gets them invovled in their own learning!

This post was submitted by Rachel.

PASS THE CHICKEN!

The prop is the most important element to this game : ) To begin, all students sit in a circle. Select one person to be IT. That person holds the rubber chicken. The teacher or a “caller” says to the person holding the chicken, “Name five animals. Pass the chicken!” As soon as the caller says, “Pass the chicken,” the person holding the chicken passes it to the right. Students quickly pass the chicken around the circle. If it returns to the original holder before he or she can name five animals, the holder is still IT. Otherwise, the person holding the chicken when IT finishes listing five animals is the new IT.

A nice part of this game is it really doesn’t matter if the topics are easy or hard… it’s pretty random who is going to be IT next : ).

Some Easy Topics

• animals
• fruit
• famous people
• songs
• books
• clothing
• weather words
• holidays
• countries
• languages

Anything that fits your curriculum!

This post was submitted by Ellen.

Whatever vocabulary list / word bank you have – you can map it! Yes, just ask the students to draw a local map or a floor plan of a house or even a zoo layout.

Next, ask the students to put each vocab item in a particular place. Ask them to explain their choices. 

ie. Colors.  I put blue in my livingroom because it is where I like to think and feel blue! 

Students can discuss their choices and why they put X in Y.  It works like a charm and even fosters critical thinking skills. A wonderful technique for learning / acquiring vocabulary (because we know we acquire vocab. better if we connect it to an object / place).

This post was submitted by David Deubelbeiss.

Simply use this handy organizer and get the students to list all the vocab for a certain topic (at the beach, at the restaurant, animals, jobs etc…).

Afterwards, you can use this for assessment or simply play a game of scattegories. Students read out their answers, one at a time for each letter and get points. No repeating what others have said.

Simple but effective!

This post was submitted by David Deubelbeiss.

The weather is a standard topic and beyond reviewing the vocabulary (which you can do with this powerpoint I made ) , you can really do it communicatively by getting students to do / practice weather reports!

After going through the vocabulary and asking students “What’s the weather like in…..? or …today? -  Give them a map of their own country.  Ask them to draw weather symbols on the map and also numbers for high/low temperatures. Model this by doing your own on the board then giving each student a map.

Elicit student language. Here’s an example from the British Council.   Ask students – What’s the weather like in …..?  What the temperature in….? 

Students make their own weather map and then present or answer questions with other students. Finally, get a few students to do a weather TV report and/or show an actual video of a news report. 

You will also amaze students with this real time “World Sunlight Map“.

This post was submitted by David .

There are several steps to making a storybook and I’ll use my own Mr. X’s incredible Day/Yesterday as an example. Get the ppt/video here for use with students.

1.  Tell the story with students. Play a video / use a storybook / use a ppt but pictures are essential! Go slow and exaggerate and use your voice/gestures to communicate vocabulary and content/context.

2.  Students re-tell the story. Note the vocabulary for the story on the board and students use this to make sentences to retell the story. Or, just show pictures and use them as a prompt to retell the story. See how I used Voicethread to retell the Mr. X story. But you can just take the words off the ppt and use a picture only ppt.

3. Writing. Students are now more comfortable with the story and vocabulary. Get them to write 6-10 sentences to outline the story. For each sentence , provide a prompt on the board for lower level students. Higher level students can add more information for that sentence number. The teacher monitors and helps correct/edit. I use this worksheet for Mr. X.

4. Bookmaking.  Give students some sheets of A4. They fold in half and staple to make the book. Or fold again and cut the folds to make a mini book (students usually like this smaller book more!). Students cut and paste their pictures into the book and also write their text from the worksheet. Color, make a title page, borders and personalize.

5. Present/Publish. Students can read their books to the class or in small groups. Sharing is a must! Make a library for your student produced books! 

You can make books about just vocabulary also. You can even use Tar Heel Reader – to get pictures and inspiration for alphabet and vocabulary books. I highly recommend it and if you want to make an electronic book, get a password code and impress your students!

This post was submitted by David Deubelbeiss.