Last Letter First Letter

Language Area: General vocabulary or specific vocabulary areas (e.g. animals,

food, jobs)
When to use the activity: Use it at the start of a class as a warm-up activity
or at the end of a class to review vocabulary.
Preparation: None
Procedure:
1). Arrange the learners in a circle.
2). Say a word e.g. apple to start the game.
3). The next person has to say a word with the last letter of the previous word.
(In the example: apple, egg, giraffe, ear,..............). The next person in the circle
does the same. Set a time limit.
4). If a learner cannot say a word, then they are out.

Dont Say Yes/No

Language Area: Yes/No questions and short answers, Speaking

Preparation: Decide on alternative answers to yes and no
Procedure:
1). Brainstorm a list of alternatives to answering yes or no to a question. e.g. I
dont know, Possibly, I did, I am, etc.
2). Ask a yes/no question to a learner. He/She has to answer the question
truthfully without saying yes or no.
3). If the learner does say yes or no, they are out and choose another learner.
Variations:
1). Instead of the teacher asking the questions, get one volunteer to stand in
front of the class. The rest of the class asks the volunteer questions. Set a time
limit (e.g. 1 minute), if within that time the volunteer has not said yes or no,
he/she has won.
2). Divide the class into two teams. A student from team A answers questions
from team B, until he/she says yes or no. Give a time limit of one minute. If the

student doesnt say yes or no, they get 1 point/ Then it is the turn of someone
from team B to answer team A. The winning team is the one who gets the most
points.

Bingo

Language Area: Listening

Preparation: Decide on a group of words or numbers that you wish to practice.
Have no more than 20 words.
Procedure:
1). Use flashcards or real objects to elicit the vocabulary and spelling from the
students.
2). Show the learners how to make a Bingo grid. Use 4 parts for younger learners
and more for learners of higher ability.

3). Read out the words on the board in any order, making a note of them as you
do so. If the learners hear a word that they have written in their Bingo grid they
should cross it out.
4). The first learner to cross out all the items on their grid calls out Bingo!, and
reads out their list. This person is the winner.
5). To make it more challenging, you might want to put them in sentences.
6). If you want, you can continue until you have read out all the words to enable
all the learners to complete the game.

Variations:
1). Learner Bingo Grid: Divide the class into groups of 4 to 6. Each group
represents a Bingo grid. Each learner represents one word. When a learner hears
his or her word called, he or she sits down.

2). Bingo Grammar: See below

Grammar Bingo

Language Area: Any language area

Preparation:
Procedure: (The procedure is using present continuous as an example)
1). Brainstorm 15-20 sentences in the present continuous indicating physical
actions and write them on the board, e.g. they are playing football, the cat is
sleeping, etc.
2). Ask the learners to make a Bingo grid (use 4 for less able learners). Tell them
to choose any four sentences and draw them quickly. Set a time limit so they will
all be ready at the same time.
3). The teacher calls out the sentences in random order and the learners cross
out the pictures on their grid if the sentence and the picture is the same.
4). When a learner has crossed out all his/her pictures, he/she shouts out Bingo!
5). Play the game several times to give each learner the chance to do well and to
give more practice in the chosen language area.

Hangman

Language Area: Vocabulary and Spelling

Preparation: Decide on what vocabulary words you want to review and what
the exact picture required to hang the man (see example below)

Procedure:
1). Think of a word, and draw a short line on the board for each letter of that
word. This tells the learners how many letters are in each word.
2). The other learners try to guess the letters of the word, one at a time.
3). Each time they guess wrongly, a part is added to a simple picture of a
hanging man.
4). If the picture is completed, the man hangs and the guessing learners have
lost the game.
5). If a learner guesses the word correctly, he/she thinks of the next word to use
and plays the role of the teacher.
Variations:
1). Put the learners into teams. Each team has to nominate a speaker. This
makes the game more competitive while avoiding the chaos of everyone
guessing at once.

Fast Words

Language Area: General vocabulary or specific vocabulary areas (e.g. animals,

food, jobs)
Preparation: None
Procedure:
1). Divide the class into teams. Make sure each team has space for one person to
write on the board.
2). Get one learner from each group to come to the board.

3). Give them a letter (e.g. f). They have to think of as many words as possible
starting with that letter and write them on the board.
4). After a time (e.g. 1 minute), change the person writing on the board and also
the letter.
5). Do this for everybody in each team.
Variations:
1). If there isnt enough space on the board, give each team a sheet of paper to
write on, and the students can takes turns being the writer.
2). Use categories (e.g. food, animals, jobs, clothing, colours, classroom items,
etc)

Noughts and Crosses/Tic-Tac-Toe

Language Area: Vocabulary/Grammar

Preparation: Decide on which vocabulary you want to use or what grammar
point you want to revise (e.g. present continuous)
Procedure:
1). Draw a noughts and crosses grid on the board. Put in the words that you want
to revise (e.g. for the present continuous, put in the infinitives of each verb)

2). Divide the class into two teams. One team is X and the other team is O.
3). Each team takes in turns to select a word in the grid. If they use it correctly in
a sentence, they score a X or O in that box. Only one person in each team can
answer without asking their teammates
4). One team wins if they make a line either vertically, horizontally, or diagonally.
Variations:

This game can be used for any grammar point or vocabulary set. Adapt it to suit
your class.

Action Story

Language Area: Vocabulary, Speaking

Preparation: Plan actions for the different words in a story
Procedure:
1). Select a story, the more words you can do actions for the better, and create
different actions for the words.
2). Pre-teach the actions to the words. Let the learners try to guess rather than
telling them the words.
3). Tell the story by doing the actions. The learners have to guess the words.
4). When the story is finished, speak the words and the learners do the actions.

Running Dictation

Language Area: Reading, Writing, Listening, Speaking, Remembering

Preparation: Write the sentences on different pieces of paper
Procedure:
1). Select a piece of text appropriate to the learners level. Before the class
starts, put the different sentences hanging around the classroom.
2). Put learners into groups of 3-5 or pairs for small classes. Each group has one
writer and the rest are runners.
3). The runners go around the classroom, reads and remembers one sentence,
and returns to his/her group.
4). They then tell the writer what the sentence is, and the writer writes the
sentence.
5). When each group has all the sentences, they put them in order.
6). The first group who shows the correct answer to the teacher wins.

Variations:
1). For lower level learners, use words instead of sentences. (e.g. you could have
some groups finding words that begin with m and some groups finding words
that begin with n).
2). For more advanced classes, take the final sheet of paper away and get them
to work together to rewrite it from memory. This is a very good way of stretching
their memory even further!
3). Give points to each team (e.g. 100 for first, 90 for second, 80 for third, etc.)
and take away one point for each error. The winner is the team with the most
points remaining.
4). If you feel that the groups will copy off each other, use different stories. Put
each story of a different colours.