I love the idea of using a game of charades to make English learning fun for young kids. But sometimes it can be difficult to incorporate the game into a structured class.

I was introduced to this method of charades last week by a patient and creative 3rd grade teacher here in Japan. Here’s the magic:

Split the class into 3 groups, A / B / C.

Team A will be split into two = the guesser and the actors.

Place two small lines of chairs opposite of, and facing each other, in the front of the room.
Team A’s guessers sit on one side, Team A’s actors sit on the other.
Team B and C sit in the remaining chairs, facing the front, as an audience.

The JTE stands behind Team A guessers with the flashcards.
The ALT stands at the blackboard behind the actors, and keeps score and starts/stops the timer.

When the class chants “ready, GO!”, the JTE turns over the first flashcard and shows it to the actors. (The guessers can’t see it because the JTE is behind them.) The first actor comes forward and acts out the gesture. When anyone from the guessing side yells the correct word with pronunciation, the ALT records one point for Team A on the board. Immediately, the JTE shows the next card, and the next actor comes forward to perform the gesture. Continue until the timer beeps at 1 MINUTE.

Have the teams rotate so that Team B is now at the front, split into guessers and actors, and Teams A & C are the audience.

Play so that each team goes twice, the guessers and actors rotating so everyone gets a chance at both roles. Tally the points at the end and congratulate everyone on how many English words their team yelled!

This has worked well for the really young kids – 1st-2nd graders, to practice “Hello, my name is …, nice to meet you!”

Have the students sit in a large circle on the floor. Each student takes their turn one at a time.

The student stands up, says “Hello!” to the group. The group answers “Hello!!!”.
The student then introduces themselves, saying “My name is … Nice to meet you!”
The group responds “Nice to meet you!”.
Next victim.

With the right class, this is a good, positive way to practice the sentences.

Vocabulary: fruits, vegetables, colors.

Grammar: “What color is it?” / “Fruit or vegetable?”

The teacher chooses a secret fruit or vegetable.

The students then ask as a class, “What color is it?”. The teacher answers, “It’s red / brown…”

The students then ask as a class, “Fruit or vegetable?”. The teacher answers, then the class guesses what the secret food is.

Reward correct answers as you like!

A great way to have your students practice the names of family members. Having the students introduce their own families helps them with a sense of ownership of the language.

Introduce the word “family”. The teacher then says to the class…

“My family is mother, father, sister, me!”. (However the teacher’s family is).

The students then can take turns raising their hands and translating one of the English words into Japanese, example, “okaasan”, etc… until the class has figured out what the teacher said! They can get a kick just out of having understood the teacher! If a JTE is present, repeat with the their family too, for more practice.

Formally teach the family names and have the class repeat. Then ask for volunteers to say their family – “My family is…” and the rest of the class can translate.

Then, play karuta or similar group game to help their memory of the vocabulary.

Materials: Each student’s name on a small placard with magnet attached (or just have them write their names on the board).  / 2 large dice / illustrated month cards.

This is a great activity for teaching the months of the year to elementary school students (or likely any age for that matter). As usual, it’s all in the presentation and set-up…

SET UP
Tell the students you’re going to be learning “months”. If they don’t know what that is, ask them their birthdays, then repeat the month they say each time… they’ll get it. Then let them know that since there’s 12 months, it’s a little difficult to remember all of them, so we’re going to use our birthdays to remember.

REPETITION
Start by placing the January card on the board, and having the class repeat after you. Then ask whose birthday is in January. When they raise their hands, have them come up to the board and place their name cards (or write their names) under the January card. Then coach each of them briefly on the pronunciation of the month before they go back to their seats.  Continue this process for all the months.

Go through all the months once as a class.

Then go through the months as a class again and have the students stand up and say the month even louder when it’s their birthday. Repeat 2 or 3 times, getting faster and faster, so the kids have fun trying to stand up and sit down really fast, and get used to hearing the 12 months said in order.

THE GAME
Split the class into two teams – split down the middle of the room. Put a score board up. Have the teams huddle up together close to the front, but forming an aisle down the middle of the room between them.

Choose one student from each team to start the game, and come to the front of the aisle with you. Hand each student a dice. When you say go, they each roll their dice down the aisle.

The students must raise their hand and tell you the name of the month corresponding to the numbers on the dice.
For example: 3 and 5 = 8, so the answer is “August”.

Their teammates may help them, as they are likely to have a teammate with a birthday in that month.

One point goes to the first team to say the month, (only the original player can raise their hand and answer), and then play starts again with the next two players. The game ends when everyone has had a chance to play.

THOUGHTS
By having the teammates help each other, it takes the pressure off the individual while handing out responsibility and ownership at the same time!

The dice-rolling turned into a bowling competition in one of my classes, but the dice are soft, so it just made the game more fun for them. This was one of the first games I have played where the students seemed to forget that they were trying to learn a new language, and were able to relax and have fun instead.

If you try this, let me know how it goes!

I just came across this site by Ted Power, which he calls English Language Learning and Teaching.

He has a great collection of worksheets that you can print out to use in fostering discussion of various topics.

These topics include:

Alternative beliefs | Animal Welfare | The Arts | Crime & Punishment | Cultural Differences | Economics | Education | Environment | Fashion | Food | Health | Holidays | Language Learning | Make & Female Roles | Marriage | The Media | Political Systems | Religion | Rich & Poor World | Science & Technology | Society | Sport | Tradition | Transport | Travel | Violence | Work | Youth & Old Age

From the Churchill House School of English Language

Here is a downloadable worksheet to prepare for a game of “Can I borrow…?”

This activity practices school items and borrowing.

This site has a number of free downloads.

Here is an easy-to-read handout for the basic English grammar words: noun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, question words.

See all their handouts here.

This site has a number of free downloads.

Here is a worksheet with card cutouts to practice phrasal verbs that relate to people’s relationships with each other.

See all their handouts here.

This site has a number of free downloads.

Here’s a handout for the introduction of irregular verbs.

See all their handouts here.