creative, interesting games for warm up activities.includes what to do, how to play, notes for new teacher.This task will help the teachers in their carrier if they want to make the lessons mote interesting. The warm ups help the kids with lesson start every student can work with the dictionary, or if the task is given for home work he or she has more time for preparing. This task gives the various possibilties to enlarge the vocabulary and to find the right option. It can be given at the beginning of the lesson or in the end, and if the pupils are not so good at learning it may be given for home work. The ideas with pictures are never ending.
Print this PDF and keep in the teacher’s office The Chain Really simple but fun warmer today At the start of the class, get your students sitting in a circle One student starts by saying a word The next student must say a word beginning with the last letter of the first student's word The next student must then say a word starting with the last letter of the previous and so on and so on, around the circle Love Elephant Talking Good Daydream , etc, etc The object of this game is just to get the class warmed up and using a little English before you start your 'real' class, so just have some fun with this See if you can make it three times around the circle! Lower levels or younger classes can use their course books to help Tip: Keep this light-hearted Be ready to help student's if they can't think up of a word Always keep your students' confidence high Go Bananas! This is a really funny classroom game which your classes are guaranteed not to have done before It is a mix of a sentence structure game and an unusual Indian sport called Kabadi! Get a sentence or two of a recently studied topic, or just something level appropriate Photocopy this out so you have the same sentence twice Try to make the words nice and big, at least size 48 on Word Cut the sentences up into individual words and put them into two separate envelopes Both envelopes should contain all the words needed to make the original sentence Divide the class into two teams If you have a big class, make three teams and three envelopes Put all envelopes on a table at the other end of the classroom How to Play Get teams into lines One student from each team must race out to try to put the sentence into order at the table However, while they this, they must not breathe in!! To prove they are not cheating, they must constantly say 'Banana' over and over and over again! As soon as they can't go on, they must run back to their line and tag-in the next student who runs in and takes over from where the last student left off Again, they must say 'Banana' constantly until they can not go on and have to return for the next person The first team to get all of their words into the correct order wins! Tips: Don't make the sentence too short, otherwise the first few students will finish it with the rest of the class not getting a go and feel disappointed Similarly, don't make it too long that it becomes an impossible exercise You may have to experiment a little here to get the right balance Perhaps go to the class armed with two sentences If you plan to use this with multiple classes, consider using a different coloured font for each team That way, at the end of the class, you can whack all the words back into the right envelopes according to colour rather than having a big, mixed-up pile of random words to sort out on your precious break between classes! No colour printer? No worries, simply run a different coloured feltpen on the reverse side of the sentence before you cut it up Human Bingo! This is a brilliant warmer which will get your class speaking straight away! The best thing is that you can adjust the difficulty to suit any age or any level so you can all use this today! Give each student a sheet of A4 paper Each student uses a pen to divide the sheet into sections, like a naughts and crosses board - two lines across, two lines going down The teacher writes around 15 questions of the board to suit the level of the students Easy for small kids, harder for advanced students Each student chooses eight of these questions and writes the questions in the squares, leaving the centre space blank Students then must speak to eight different students to get their answers These answers are written on their paper At the end of the activity, have feedback For example: Teacher: Who spoke to Lucky? Teacher: What did Lucky say? Student 1: Me Student 1: She wakes up at 7am Student 2: I did Student 2: Supermarket, greengrocers, bookstore Teacher: What did you ask her? Student 1: What time you wake up? Student 2: Tell me three shops Are you looking for a new teaching job in China after your current contract or Mallett's Mallet! a new teacher for your school? Teaching jobs in 100+ China cities! Visit www.rayenglish.com or email us at: teachers@rayenglish.com Activity of the Day: Word Grab! This is the perfect activity to lift a dreary class! Choose a suitable song (not too fast), and choose about 15 keywords from the song Write the words in big letters on paper and stick the words on the blackboard Also write about words which don't appear in the song and put these on the board too Be sure to put all the words in a random order Get the students into two teams and have them form lines Play the song and the first student of each line has to run out and grab the word they hear off the board If you are worried about your words getting totally wrecked, then just have students point to the correct word (Each student only gets one try, they can't just point at all of the words until they get the right one!) This is a great game which is good for listening practice If you need to, you can play the song twice or pause it where needed Tip: Remember if you choose your one of favourite songs, which you have listened to 1000 times, then this will seem easy to you Remember that this could be the first time your students may have listened to it and they won't know what is coming next in the same way you do! Take it easy with your students Lottery Winner!!! *Note: You can one, two or all of these activities depending on what you want to and how much time you have) Lead in (5-10 minutes) - Ask class if they know what a lottery is Ask if there is a lottery in China (there is, Sports Lottery, Welfare Lottery, etc) Do any of your students play? Why/why not? Have they won any money before? How much? Activity #1 - The Newspaper Interview (30-45 mins) - Get a photo of a lottery winner Show the class and tell your students that they have just won $200,000,000 Ask your students how he/she might feel What you think he/she would spend the money on? Get ideas - Tell students that they are newspaper reporters and have to get an interview with the lottery winner Have pairs of students think of 4-5 questions they would ask the lottery winner for the newspaper When finished, interview different pairs of students Activity #2 (20-30 mins) - What to with the Money? Put students into groups to decide the best way to spend the money and present it to the class They can either get mansions, golf courses in their back garden, etc, or can be more imaginative or charitable, up to the groups! Activity #3 Lottery Draw! (15-20 mins) - Before class, go to the shop and buy 12 ping-pong balls and a black permanent marker Write numbers 1-12 on each ball, and put them in a bag If your students want to, collect 0.5RMB from each student (or 1RMB if they are high-rollers haha) and hand them each a slip of paper Tell them that they are going to play the lottery Each student must write three numbers from 1-12 on their paper Go around and check each paper to see that it has been done right - Tell the class that they will play the lottery You will pick three balls from the bag If they can match two numbers, they win 2RMB If they match all three, then they win the pot!! (You can usually play 3-4 games before the pot is empty) Ask the winners and losers how they felt afterwards No More lives! This is a quick and easy flashcard game for children The purpose of the game is to help kids to memorise the key vocabulary in your lesson No fuss! What to Using flashcards, pre-teach five words from the page in your course book you are on Now get all your kids to turn around facing the other way and place your five flashcards face down in an order that only you know For example: Car (first), plane (second), train (third), bus (fourth), bicycle (fifth and last) Get the students to turn back around and then hand out eight coloured chips or pieces of paper to the students These represent lives Each chip represents a life! Ask your students which word they think is first If they get it wrong (for example, they guess 'bus', then tell them that its wrong and take one of their chips away Let them guess again If they get it wrong again, then take another of their lives away If they get it right, then turn over the flashcard to show them and keep going (although they don't get any lives back, they just keep going.) This game is an ESL classic and an absolute winner if you teach Young Learners here in China Kids aged 4+ will really respond to playing this language game and it will help them to review words or simple sentences very well All you need is a whiteboard, a large dice, board marker and two board magnets (If you don't have board magnets, or have a glass white board, then you can simply draw two different symbols for each team) What to Do Divide your class into two teams If you have a large class, then you can divide them into three or four teams just as easily Draw the following on the whiteboard: Put both teams' board magnets in one of the grey sections at the start of the game Both teams start with five lives Choose a team to start and ask them a question - this could be a 'What's this?' (pointing at a flashcard) or a simple question If they get it right, then they can roll the dice Move the team's marker around the board the number of moves shown on the dice If they land on a ghost or a spider, then they lose a life! Make a spooky, scary noise when they land on the booby square! It is now the other team's go Ask and question and move them around, losing a life if they land on a ghost or spider If a team lands on a grey section, then they don't lose a life or gain one If they land on the shield, then they get one life back Keep playing until one team has no more lives The first team to lose all of their lives is the loser Have fun teaching this week! This is a brilliant ESL game to practice giving advice It should be played after a 'giving advice' vocabulary lesson has taken place It is a great way for students to see what they have remembered and what needs reviewing This game works well with any age group, particularly adults, just adapt it to fit the age you're working with How to play Write ailments or problems related to your most recent lesson on post-it notes and stick one post-it note on each student's back The students must mingle and ask for advice from other students to solve their problem Students should be able to guess their problem based on the advice they get from their peers Use more complicated or obscure problems to make the game more interesting for older students For lower levels and younger students, announce a category or reference a recent lesson, like "Health", to help them along Chinese learners often have difficulty in using a range of adjectives and instead just rely on a couple for almost everything How many times have you heard 'My hometown is very beauitful' or 'The food is very delicious' waaay too many times Students here get comfortable with a handful of adjectives and stick to them As TEFL teachers, we need to get students out of this hole This is an activity where students need to use a wider range of adjectives in order to succeed What to Do - Pre-teach a number of adjectives to describe size, weight and texture - Get a cardboard box and fill it with about 10 different items For example, a feather, a ping-pong ball, a coin, sandpaper, a pencil, a key, etc - Now blindfold a student and bring them to the front of the class and seat them in front of the box - Choose one of the items and hold it up for the class to see, but don't tell the blindfolded student which object you have chosen - Put the item back inside and the class now need to use language to help the blindfolded student to find the mystery item by feeling inside and lifting it up into the air "It's round " "It's smooth " "It's light " "It's rough " "It's hard " Give everyone a go and build confidence in your students to use more diverse adjectives naturally and comfortably Today's post is a cool flashcard game and an excellent way for students to memorise vocabulary You need 10-15 flashcards with vocabulary you want to review What to Do Have your students sitting in a large circle Join the circle and then go through the vocabulary with the class Choose a good student and have them say one of the flashcards you are holding up The student is then given this card Move on to a second student, hold up the card, and get them to say it This student then keeps this card Keep going around the class until every student has one of the flashcards Get your students to hold up their flashcards and ask your students to memorise as many of the flashcards as possible and their position in the circle After 30 seconds, ask your students to hold their flashcards facing down on their laps so that no one can see each other's cards Choose a student to try to point at another student and saying which flashcard they have If the guessing student gets the word right, then they can 'steal' that new flashcard, so they now have two flashcards and loser has none Keep going around the class with students stealing each other's cards It can be great fun trying to keep track of which card is where! Click on the picture above to download our Jobs PDF (Switch on your VPN) This is a classic TEFL Warmer, which has been used by teachers for years You can use this with most levels and it’s a great way for your students to wake up and get switched on for your lesson What to Do? Divide your students into two teams and have them form two lines facing the board (If you have a large class, simply make three or four teams.) Draw a line down the middle of the board and give the first person in each line a board pen At the top of board write a category, for example, Things in the House or Colours The first student from each line now runs out and writes a word to with this category in their side of the board They then run back to the line, give the pen to the next player and then go to the back of the line The first team to ten words, or the most within one minute, is the winner Tip: Be on hand to help with spelling and make sure everyone gets a go Have fun! This is a game that should take place after the students have already been taught the proper words or sentence structure The great thing about this activity is that it suits classes of any size, every student is involved in every round It's a great chance for everyone to feel like they can USE the language What to Do Before class, print of some simple pictures which represent what you have been learning There should be no words These can be single word pictures for lower levels i.e pen, book, chair, or a number of pictures which can be used to represent sentences Below is what I used in my class recently (The tiger can eat meat, the elephant can't eat soup, the monkey can't drink tea, the cat can eat fish): Place students into pairs If you have an odd number of students in your class you can have one team of students or if you have another teacher in your class you can get them involved and place one of the strong students with them Have one student from each team stand up and follow you out in to the hallway to look at the first picture Number or point to the picture you'll be using that round The intention is to have each individual tell you what the picture represents, while you correct any major mistakes, before releasing them back in to the classroom They will, in turn, tell their partner what the first picture is Then the partner has to run to you and tell you what the first picture is (without having seen it.) Give one point / sticker/ high-five to the first few teams to relay the message correctly back to you Have everyone sit down, ask that the other partner now stand up to the first leg of the race Rinse and repeat Do make sure that everyone has a go Teaching Tips This game seems to hold the complete interest of all students in a class for a maximum of rounds Don't drag it out too long and you'll get the best out of this activity Even weaker students will want to stand up and have a go with this one, and if they are a little slow you'll get a little alone time outside correcting them before letting them back in to tell their partner There may be more energy than you're used to in your classroom, and you'll probably get swarmed by a mass of kids shouting the answer in your face, in which case you'll want to implement a 'NO SCREAMING' rule Go through this activity with your Teaching Assistant before you go into the classroom If your TA ever doesn't understand your instructions and tells the students what to incorrectly, it isn't their fault, it's yours Work well with your co-teacher Have you got a class (or a number of classes) that simply don't want to participate - or you find yourself picking the same students time after time? There is a way around it, and I call this method THE TERROR CARDS Materials: Standard playing cards, white sticky labels, marker pen What to Do Get enough sticky labels and cards so that every student has their own playing card Write one student's name on each card (if the students know their English names well, just write their English names on the cards, otherwise add their pinyin names as well) Then introduce them to the class Explain that this is how you will be choosing students to answer questions - if they answer a question correctly, they can choose a card from the deck My students have a love/hate relationship with the Terror Cards - they love picking certain students out, but they hate having their name called out I recently made my decks a little more interesting by adding "Student Choice" and "Teacher Choice" into each deck - this puts some power into the hands of either the student or I This is ideal for middle school, high school and university classes - probably not so good for training centers where the classes are small, but I recommend that you give it a go This activity is suitable for all ages and all levels where you have Questions and Answers, from personal introductions (name, age, hometown, etc) up to more complex stuff such as hobbies, film tastes, whatever It‟s a really useful activity and the students will find this beneficial to improve their English What to Pre-teach a question and answer to the class For right now, we'll take 'hometown' as an example: Q: "Where are you from?" A: "I'm from Xi'an, China." Practice this a few times with your class Once you feel they are happy with it, ask all your students to stand up and find a partner Tell them to play Paper, Scissors, Stone with their partner The winner gets to ask the question, the loser has to answer They now both go and find a new partner and play again; the winner asking the question, the loser answering This activity is a great way for your class to mingle and to be producing the target language repeatedly in an unusual way with different partners; Its works really well and the students enjoy it very much Be on hand to help with pronunciation and kill the activity when everyone has spoken to each other In this activity students write about their ideal day, then get to test how well they know their peers by guessing which day belongs to which student This is great for older teens and adults, both for practicing writing and getting to know their classmates What you will teach - Writing skills - Expressing creativity and imagination - Peer correction - Various tenses depending on lesson aims The Set up Tell your class they are going to imagine and describe their perfect day, where they would be, what they would do, who they are with, etc Move onto brainstorming-related categories and adjectives (the more creative, the better) For example: locations, activities/hobbies, friends/celebrities, food/drink Note - It’s a good idea to tell each student not to mention their favourite thing, this makes the guessing game at the end more challenging Then you can establish your target tense and some review if necessary Past tense - “Yesterday was my perfect day, it began Conditional - “My perfect day would start with Activity Now have the students write about their perfect day They should have enough ideas from the introduction to this, just encourage them to use their imagination! Once they have completed the activity, collect papers and hand them out again Have each student read a day and then get the class to guess who it belongs to Most people are afraid of something One of the most common fears is the fear of spiders Other fears may include fear of heights, fear of snakes and even fear of the moon These fears are called phobias Begin your lesson by giving your students a list of words ending in phobia such as arachnophobia, ophidiophobia, claustrophobia, anthropophobia and selenophobia Explain that these words mean fear of „something‟, ask them to guess what that „something‟ is Spend a few minutes on this It works as a great lead-in to the rest of the class Conversation Element: Then ask your class if they have any fears This will open up an interesting discussion between your students You can use any of the questions below for gentle prompting: Are you afraid of flying? Are you afraid of going to the dentist? Are you afraid of ghosts? Are you afraid of heights? Are you afraid of giving a speech in public? Are you afraid of scary movies? Are you afraid of the dark? Questions for more advanced levels: Do you know anyone with a phobia? Do you know anyone with a strange phobia? Have you overcome any of your fears? How? What animal you think is the scariest? Why? Do you believe people can be cured of phobias by hypnosis? How you cope with your fears? Dear English teachers in China and around the world, Many thanks for downloading The Big Juicy Warmers Pack I hope you and your colleagues enjoy using this pack and that it gives you some inspiration and fun in your classes If you have any good games you use yourself, and would like to submit them, then please send them along to me at: stuart@rayenglish.com TEFL Lemon is owned by RAY English Recruitment, China‟s largest dedicated ESL teacher recruitment agency If you are looking for a new job in China, then please email me at the above address and I will deal with your application personally All of our placement services are 100% FREE to teachers, so get in touch today! All the best, Stuart Allen TEFL Lemon RAY English TEFL Recruitment [...]... a fun warmer to start off your adults' lessons this week 1 Get students into small groups 2 Tell the class that you need help with some problems 3 Groups must take it in turns to call out help for you 4 Before you start, write a problem on the board and write down suggestions of how you can be helped to show the class what they need to do 5 You are now ready to begin Get one idea from each group, then... print it out to A3 You now have a big, clear key to stick on the whiteboard for your students to follow Now for the messages Jump back on the computer and type out short words or messages using the Webdings font on Microsoft Word You can either choose them all the same, or have a couple of different messages This is more fun for the kids in my view Print out the page of coded messages, cut them into individual... Chinese mini-menu? Click on this picture to download for free! The mini-menu is great fun to make – simply print, cut, fold and glue and you have a full Chinese menu for your pocket, wallet or bag! Message on a Lollypop! This Young Learner activity is for kids who are just beginning to read and write in English You can easily grade this activity to make it super easy or a bit more challenging It is best... all the items on their list for as little as possible! Before class, set three tables in your classroom These table zones will be your supermarkets Spread them apart as much as you can On each table, put a list of items which that particular supermarket sells and how much each item costs When class begins, tell your students that a few of them will be shop assistants in a supermarket and the rest of... needed and listen out for any language errors which you can either help with straight away or go through at the end if you wish Depending on the level/age of your students, you can adjust the difficulty and number of the items on the list For lower levels, use words like 'bread' and 'milk', for higher levels you can use items like 'ketchup, 'chicken fillets' or 'instant noodles' After a supermarket has sold... If your class is 14, cut 7 lengths of string and so on - one length of string per pair If you have odd numbers, put one group into a three or you join in yourself Get everyone to stand up in a large circle Have all of the string bunched up in a ball in your hand (but not tangled up) with the ends poking out Ask each student to grab one end of a piece of string and gradually walk backwards They will... sterilizing themselves i.e a man dangling his nuts in a golf ball cleaning machine for a laugh (this has happened ) Using the Darwin Awards in the Classroom About ten years ago, I was teaching an adults class for EF English First Xi'an The unit was about 'Greatest Human Achievements' and the language point for comparatives and superlatives I flicked through the pages in the office and decided that the unit... haven't done (whether you have done it or not is irrelevant) For example, you might say: "I have never drank water." Now tell your students that if they HAVE drank water, then they should move and swap places with another student Naturally, everyone will get up and move places Give two more examples and have students get up and move around, for example, "I have never ridden a bicycle" Again, any students... six items before the teddy gets back to the first student, then he/she has won If the teddy gets back first before the player has said sx things, then the player in the middle loses! Pairing up students During your classes, teachers will need to pair up students This often means just pairing up students with the person they are sitting next to This should be avoided Always having the same pairs means... Preparation: A few days before class, pop into a corner shop and buy one lollypop per student in your class They are only 1RMB each, so no big sweat Choose a suitable word or small sentence for your class If you have 5 year-olds, this might be 'dog', 'cat', cow', whatever For slightly older classes, it could be 'My name is', or 'I like .' I'll leave this to you First prepare your key for the whiteboard In