Category: Teaching Ideas

6 Fun Activities Exhausted ESL Teachers Will Appreciate At The End Of The Term

I have one more week of teaching ahead of me. Three more weeks of work. There is more paperwork now than actual teaching. The kids can smell the summer holidays in the air and it shows. The teachers can barely hide how exhausted they are.

And it’s hot. Scorching hot. No AC in the building and my brain is shutting off. All I can see is myself on the beach, sipping a gin&tonic. But the kids still need to be educated. Motivated. Engaged. Entertained.

The perfect time for some fun speaking activities. Group work. Games. Anything. It’s too hot to be creative. I am thankful for any useful activity I can find so I put together a couple of fun ESL activities that I’m using these days. The kids are happy. My head didn’t explode. Win-win.

1. Balderdash

This activity is based on a popular board game. It is a more fun variation of a dictionary game I sometimes play with my students. They get a couple of difficult words and have to invent fake definitions. This game is the most popular among my kids.

Vocabulary game

 

2. The holiday maze

You can make any topic into a maze activity. I like this holiday maze by TeachingEnglish. Makes everyone long for the summer break even more.

3. Murder mystery

This is a great activity even for larger groups(7-11). The victim is a cranky English teacher so the students will certainly enjoy it.

4. Taboo

This one is still popular. Revising vocabulary is always a good idea. There are plenty of different topics you can choose from.  You can try our free games on the topic of Media or Business. Other topics include Health and Food.

5. Scrabble

Whether it’s the online version or the actual board game, Scrabble is always a good choice.

6. Questionnaires and surveys

The best thing about these fun ESL activities is that the variations are endless. You can either find some or have your students create their own. It’s more fun and they also learn more. Just give them a topic, have them write 10 questions and after that, they circle the class and interview as many classmates as possible.  Finally, they inform the class about the results. Topics may include Environment, Hobbies, Books, Travel, Science, History, Media, Celebrities. 

 

You can also find some interesting ideas in this article from Lessons Plan Digger, which inspired me to write this list.

 

For even more communicative activities, click below.

 

Ridiculous Holiday Complaints: Reading And Speaking(Role-play) ESL Lesson Plan

I came across a funny article about ridiculous complaints by spoiled holidaymakers. That inspired me to create this little worksheet/activity. I used it as a warm-up activity for my students the next lesson in which we covered writing complaints – holiday edition 🙂

Teacher tip: If they can’t come up with any own ideas in the second task, let them use some ideas from the list.

Download a PDF version for easy printing Travel complaints student worksheet

ESL Role play: Holiday

Task 1

  1. In pairs read the ridiculous complaints holidaymakers made to their travel agent.

  2. Which is the craziest one? How would you have answered if you were in the place of the travel agent?

  3. Why do you think people complain about these things?

Astonishing holiday complaints

1. “I think it should be explained in the brochure that the local store does not sell proper biscuits like custard creams or ginger nuts.”

2. “We booked an excursion to a water park but no-one told us we had to bring our swimming costumes and towels.”

3. “The beach was too sandy.”

4. “On my holiday to Goa in India, I was disgusted to find that almost every restaurant served curry. I don’t like spicy food at all.”

5. “It’s lazy of the local shopkeepers to close in the afternoons. I often needed to buy things during ‘siesta’ time – this should be banned.”

6. A woman threatened to call police after claiming that she’d been locked in by staff. When in fact, she had mistaken the “do not disturb” sign on the back of the door as a warning to remain in the room.

7. “We found the sand was not like the sand in the brochure. Your brochure shows the sand as yellow but it was white.”

8. A guest at a Novotel in Australia complained his soup was too thick and strong. He was inadvertently slurping the gravy at the time.

9. “We bought ‘Ray-Ban’ sunglasses for five Euros from a street trader, only to find out they were fake.”

10. “Topless sunbathing on the beach should be banned. The holiday was ruined, as my husband spent all day looking at other women.”

11. “No-one told us there would be fish in the sea. The children were startled.”

12. “It took us nine hours to fly home from Jamaica to England. It only took the Americans three hours to get home.”

13. “I compared the size of our one-bedroom apartment to our friends’ three-bedroom apartment and ours was significantly smaller.”

14. “I was bitten by a mosquito. No one said they could bite.”

15. “The brochure stated: ‘No hairdressers at the accommodation’. We’re trainee hairdressers – will we be OK staying there?”

16. “There are too many Spanish people. The receptionist speaks Spanish. The food is Spanish. Too many foreigners now live abroad.”

17. “My fiancé and I booked a twin-bedded room but we were placed in a double-bedded room. We now hold you responsible for the fact that I find myself pregnant. This would not have happened if you had put us in the room that we booked.”

18. “We had to queue outside with no air conditioning.”

These complaints are all taken from a survey from Thomas Cook and ABTA, revealing the most ridiculous complaints holidaymakers made to their travel agent.

Task 2

Think of two similar ridiculous complaints.

Role-play the dialogue with a classmate.

Student A You are an unsatisfied holiday maker and you are going to complain!

Student B You are a holiday representative and you try to be as polite as possible and explain the misunderstanding.

Check out our communicative resources bundles.

 

ESL Conversation Lesson: Game Of Thrones And Traveling

Level: Pre- Intermediate, Intermediate
Time: 20-30min
Skills: Speaking, Listening, Vocabulary
Topic: Travel, Croatia, Northern Ireland, Iceland, Game of Thrones
PDF version for easy printing: ESL Conversation Lesson Game Of Thrones And Traveling

ESL VIDEO LESSON PLAN: GAME OF THRONES AND TRAVELING

Warm-up Questions

  1. What do you know about Croatia?
  2. What do you know about Northern Ireland?
  3. What do you know about Iceland?
  4. Which of these countries would you like to visit?

Video

Video by Unilad Adventure

Discussion

  1. Which iconic scene mentioned in the video was shot in Dubrovnik?
  2. What is the name of the stunning coast in Northern Ireland?
  3. When was the rope bridge at Carrick-a-Rede first built and by whom?
  4. How long is the Icelandic canyon with a difficult name?
  5. Who is your favourite Game of Thrones character?
  6. Who do you think will claim the Iron Throne?

Matching

Match the adjectives 1-9 to their meanings a-i.

  1. imposing

  2. prominent

  3. spectacular

  4. diverse

  5. haunting

  6. narrow

  7. sheer

  8. unspoiled

  9. diehard

  1. less wide

  2. complete (used for emphasis)

  3. not touched by civilisation

  4. strongly devoted

  5. impressive in appearance

  6. beautiful in a dramatic way

  7. very different, showing a great variety

  8. staying in your thoughts for a long time

  9. something that can easily be se

ESL Communicative Activities

 

How Can We Volunteer While On Holiday. ESL Group Work: Volunteer Holidays.

Level: Intermediate, Upper-Intermediate
Time: 30-45min
Skills: Speaking, Listening, Writing
Topic: Environment, Tourism, Volunteering
FREE PDF: Volunteer Holidays

A quick and easy ESL group activity on volunteering. It can be used as an additional resource when discussing the environment, tourism, volunteering.

  1. You can start this activity with some warm-up discussion questions.
  2. After that, put the students into groups of three(pairs also work) and let them plan the volunteer holidays.
  3. When they are ready, they present their ideas either in bigger groups or for the whole class.

Warm-up Questions

  1. What is voluntourism?
  2. Have you ever done any volunteer work?
  3. Why do people volunteer?
  4. What kinds of volunteer activities could you do in your home country or abroad?

Our communicative and vocabulary activities:

 

 

 

 

 

 

10 Websites To Make Your Lessons More Engaging And Fun

This is a list of my 10 favorite fun ESL/EFL websites which I regularly use when I want to spice things up a bit in the classroom, reward my students or give them some relax time.

These are all great for learning vocabulary, revising, they can be used in various projects, to promote reading, cooperation, creativity. There are soooo many things you can do with these sites, just use your creativity or get inspired by my tips.

1. Kahoot

With Kahoot, you can create various quizzes and games and if you’re in a bit of a hurry you can use its extensive library of quizzes. It has a number of quizzes on various vocabulary topics, grammar and many interesting topics such as history, geography, pop culture, trivia.
My tip: Have your students sign up at Kahoot and create their own quiz. You can assign them a topic based on what you’re currently studying in the class or let them choose their own topic. They love creating their own quizzes, especially those with insider jokes.

2. Baamboozle

I use this site mostly with my younger learners as it doesn’t have many higher level grammar or vocabulary quizzes.
My tip: put your students in teams (max number of teams is 4), choose a quiz and let them play the Classic mode with the power up, it’s much more fun!

3. Jeopardylabs

Everybody knows Jeopardy. So far, I was able to find any grammar or vocabulary revision quiz I needed. Lots of quizzes on many topics, but beware as the quality varies. You can create your own Jeopardy quiz and you can also assign your students a topic and let them create their own quiz to test their classmates’ knowledge.

4. Smartypins

This is a fun little Google game which can be used as a warmer, filler or a 5 minute activity when teaching travel, culture, etc.

5. Geoguessr

This is a similar site to now nonexistent Locate street (which I liked better). It uses Google Street View to drop you anywhere on the planet and you must guess your location based on vegetation, signs, people. It’s a funny way to teach the students about interesting and remote places. I sometimes use it as a reward, the kids love it. Tell them to sign up, it’s free and they will avoid the annoying pop up.

6. Merriam-Webster

I didn’t expect a dictionary website to be this entertaining. There are games, quizzes, videos. They are educational and fun and I love them.
My top picks: Name That Thing, there is also the Animal Edition of the game. You have 10 seconds to answer each question, 12 pictures and a lot of fun!
How Strong Is Your Vocabulary is also fun and you can repeat after a couple of months to see if your students’s vocabulary has improved.
Another game is a challenging puzzle which is described as “anagram puzzles meet word search.” This one can also be downloaded to mobile phone.

7. Etymonline

How often do you explain the etymology of the vocabulary you are teaching? I do it quite often as many English words come from Latin, Greek, French and it’s easier for the students to remember the words when they see how similar the words can be to words in their own language(this applies to European languages).

8. 5 Minute Mystery

As the name suggests, this site offers short, five-minute mysteries. Students have to sign up, it’s free and quick and then they can start sleuthing. Great activity for painless reading practice.

9. The Game Gal

Here you can find plenty of simple, family-friendly games. I mostly use the Word Generator for charades, pictionary and other games. The great thing is I only need my laptop and I project the words on the whiteboard, so the students don’t need computers.

10. Scrabble Sprint

Scrabble needs no introduction, so I’ll only say that this one’s fast.

Recently I posted another article about fun and useful ESL/EFL websites and it got a lot of hits. You can read it here:

My 10 Favourite ESL/EFL Resource Websites.

Check out our communicative resources.

ESL Speaking Activity: Conversation Cards

This popular ESL One Minute Talk speaking activity is great for its variability. Check out the free sample below.

Level: Pre-Intermediate, Intermediate, Upper-Intermediate
Time: 5-30min
Skills: Speaking, Listening
Topic: Various( hobbies, movies, travel, food, fashion, etc.)
PDF: One-minute Speaking Activity

Fifteen page PDF vocabulary activity. 120 topics.

Free sample version: One-Minute Speaking Activity Sample

 

Click below to download a bundle of three speaking activities.

ESL Vocabulary Activity Based on Taboo: Food

 

ESL Taboo Cards:Food and Kitchen

Level: Pre-Intermediate, Intermediate, Upper-Intermediate
Time: 5-30min
Skills: Speaking, Listening
Topic: Food
PDF: Forbidden Words: Food

Six page PDF vocabulary activity. 60 cards, more than 200 words.

Free sample version: Forbidden Words Food Sample

 

Click on the picture below to buy our other communicative activities.

ESL Picture Storytelling Activity

ESL picture storytelling activity

 

Level: Pre-Intermediate, Intermediate, Upper-Intermediate
Time:  5-15min.
Skills: speaking
Topic: travel, environment, stories, relationships, art
Download the PDF here.

This storytelling activity is suitable for various levels because students create their own stories using the vocabulary and grammar they feel comfortable using. At the same time, they can show how well they can use a wide range of vocabulary and phrases and also if they can use more complex grammar structures.

More speaking activities:

ESL Communication Activity: Science Role Plays

ESL Pair Work Activity: Teenager Issues

Agree or disagree (and why?)

ESL Teaching Idea: Class Speaking Activity

ESL Speaking Activity Worksheet: Business Plan

I’ve Told You Once, I’ve Told You a Thousand Times, Resist Hyperbole.

You’ve probably come across a couple of articles that shared
some funny grammar rules  such as:

“Verbs has to agree with their subjects.”

or

“Don’t overuse exclamation marks!!!”

I found the original list written by William Safir and published
in 1979 in the New York Times.

Years later they were shared on the internet and became a sort of a meme.
The rules are funny and brilliant, and I think they can be used in any
ESL/EFL class as perfect examples of common grammar mistakes.

So here’s a little activity that you can do with your higher level students.

Download the worksheet>>>Funny Grammar Rules Activity

Other resources:

ESL Communication Activity: Science Role Plays

ESL Game Compound Nouns Dominoes: Town and Countryside

ESL Pair Work Activity: Teenager Issues

ESL Speaking Activity Worksheet: Business Plan

ESL Speaking Activity: Conditional Discussion Questions

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