Friday 14 December 2007
WELCOME
This blog has been created to keep in touch with all of you. We hope you enjoy the songs, put the activities into practice with your own students, and share your opinions and comments with us. And first of all: HAVE FUN!
Sing and tell tales. Activities
Name with Action
Players stand in a circle. One player says his/her name and at the same time invents a matching action or movement. The player to the left then repeats the name and action and adds his/her own name and action. Then the next player does exactly the same, including the names and actions of the people before and so on around the circle. If any player makes a mistake, the action returns to the first player.
Self portrait Self Portrait
All players are given a piece of paper and pen. They are then given 30 seconds to draw themselves and include in their drawing the answer to a series of questions that has been put on the board: i.e. What do they do for a living? What do they want to be? Where do they want to go? What do they dream of? Something they are very embarrassed about. Something they love very much.
The drawings are then passed on to the person next to them. The person who receives the drawing must introduce the artist BUT ONLY according to what they ACTUALLY SEE or can presuppose from the self-portrait.
Variation 1
Ask people to create ridiculous stories about one another according to the drawing they are given. Encourage creativity by modelling and example first.
Human bingo
Give the students a piece of paper with as many questions as people are in the activity. All the questions start with Find somebody who…… The students have to answer all the questions asking their partners.
How’s yours?
One person is elected to leave the group or room for a 30 seconds while the group decides on an object that they each may possibly have or share in common. Then the person comes back to the group and asks each person one-by-one the question “how’s yours?” to which they answer with a simple descriptive adjective or descriptive phrase. For example the group decides on the topic such as ”shoes” for which a reply to the question “how’s yours?” might be “tied” or “brown” or “old” or even something like “need’s replacing”.
True and false chairs
The teacher prepare some sentences (some of them true and some of them false). Two chairs in the front of the class (the true and the false chairs). The class is divided in two teams and put in two lines. When the teacher read one sentence, one player from each team must run and sit down choosing the true of false chair. The player who sits in the right chair is awarded with a point.
Advert
Ask the students in pairs to design a product thay would like in their life. In pairs they circle and explain their products.
Find a prop (a blanket) and in groups they must perform their advert for an invented product.
Rhyming words
Give the students say 10 simple words in groups they must find words that rhyme and write then down with the 20 words play fish.
Then give the students a song and ask them to invent another verse eg. We 3 kings
I feel … when…
Elicit all the adjectives (feeling words) from the students and write them on the blackboard. Students take it in turns to make sentences for example: “I feel... embarrassed when… I speak English in front of a lot of people.”
When all the adjectives are finished put the class into groups and give them 5 adjectives each on paper taken from the blackboard. The teams must then mime each adjective with the rest of the class guessing which feeling it is.
“This is a book … a what?… a book … a what? … a book … Oh a book!”
Concentration game that is more difficult to explain than to play. Everyone in a circle.
Teach this dialogue:
Person A: “This is a Book.”
Person B: “A What?”
A: “A Book.”
B: “A What?”
A: “A Book.”
B: “Ohh! A Book?”
Make sure that the group establishes a steady rhythm with this dialogue. Then the first person uses an actual book. After the line “Ohh! A Book?” player A passes the book to player B who then turns to player C on their other side and they repeat the dialogue. Practice around the circle once or twice and then introduce new objects. Put two objects in the circle one after the other to make it more difficult until every body is giving and receiving objects at the same time. This is great for building concentration.
All Change. “All those wearing…”
Simple game where everyone is seated in a circle and the leader stands in the middle. When the leader says "all those wearing blue change" everyone wearing the colour blue must change seats; the leader will also try to find a seat so that one person will be left without a seat standing in the middle. Start the game focused on clothing e.g. all those wearing jumpers change, then combine items of clothing with colours, all those with blue bras etc.
Alternatives: all those with two sisters, all those with a dog, all those who like pizza, all those who have been to Benidorm.
Tongue twisters
Run through some old favourite tongue twisters in English and in Spanish (if you like)
Give the students the format of writing the twisters and get them to write their own.
Format -
Name
What they did
When
Where
Why
e.g. Bob built a boat in Bali on his birthday because he was bored
Big fish little fish
Big fish (small action) goes round the circle and little fish (big action) changes direction).
Waiting room
In teams arrange different symptoms of illnesses each person enters alone and passes each illness onto the other players so at the end all the players have one problem players must then think of a reason for leaving the waiting the room – no one sees the doctor.
Directors cut
Write a very simple dialogue from a scene from a book the class is studying choose players to act out the scene with a director (teacher) camera man, assistant etc.
Power Station
Two teams of up to ten players line up in front of each other. The quiz leader and a helper stand at either end of the two teams. The quiz leader decides on the subject or topic based on categories, say, types of fruit and then says a name. The name could be true or false. The team that first identifies that a given name does (or does not – depending on how you play it) belong to the category must all join hands, raise their arms and shout ‘ELECTRIC!’. To win the point it is not enough for just one person to get the answer right, it must involve the whole team.
Bunny bunny bunny
In a circle players form animals in threes for example a bunny with one person in the middle, making the face and paws and the other 2 forming the ears. This action is sent across the circle to be copied by 3 other people.
Other forms – elephant, plane, kangaroo etc.
Zip, Zap, Zoom (warm-up)
This is another motion around the circle warm-up. In this warm-up one of the players points to another player to one side of them and says 'zip'. That player turns to the next player in the circle, points to them and says 'zip'. Thus the 'zip' zips around the circle in one direction. At any time a receiving player can say 'zap' to the person pointing at them. When they do the player that said 'zip' and was pointing at them must change direction of the pointing. This means that they must quickly turn around, point and say 'zip to the person that just pointed at them. Now the 'zip' can zip around the circle, but changing direction every time there is a 'zap'. Lastly the person that receives the 'zip' may elect to yell 'zoom' and point at someone anywhere in the circle. That player then restarts the 'zip' going in the direction of their choice. The group must really pay attention for this to work
Superheroes
In groups players must invent new superheroes to protect themselves against an alien invasion. They must have a name that correlates with the first letter of their name (strong Simon), a special power with a stance and a noise. All the powers of the group must complement each other
Songs
3 blind mice.
5 in the bed.
Hokey Cokey.
London’s burning
Molly Malone
My bonny lies over the ocean
Boogie woogie washer woman
We 3 kings
Today’s Monday
Grand old Duke of York
Row row row your boat
One finger one thumb
I know an old woman
Doe a deer
Rudolph the red nosed reindeer
Players stand in a circle. One player says his/her name and at the same time invents a matching action or movement. The player to the left then repeats the name and action and adds his/her own name and action. Then the next player does exactly the same, including the names and actions of the people before and so on around the circle. If any player makes a mistake, the action returns to the first player.
Self portrait Self Portrait
All players are given a piece of paper and pen. They are then given 30 seconds to draw themselves and include in their drawing the answer to a series of questions that has been put on the board: i.e. What do they do for a living? What do they want to be? Where do they want to go? What do they dream of? Something they are very embarrassed about. Something they love very much.
The drawings are then passed on to the person next to them. The person who receives the drawing must introduce the artist BUT ONLY according to what they ACTUALLY SEE or can presuppose from the self-portrait.
Variation 1
Ask people to create ridiculous stories about one another according to the drawing they are given. Encourage creativity by modelling and example first.
Human bingo
Give the students a piece of paper with as many questions as people are in the activity. All the questions start with Find somebody who…… The students have to answer all the questions asking their partners.
How’s yours?
One person is elected to leave the group or room for a 30 seconds while the group decides on an object that they each may possibly have or share in common. Then the person comes back to the group and asks each person one-by-one the question “how’s yours?” to which they answer with a simple descriptive adjective or descriptive phrase. For example the group decides on the topic such as ”shoes” for which a reply to the question “how’s yours?” might be “tied” or “brown” or “old” or even something like “need’s replacing”.
True and false chairs
The teacher prepare some sentences (some of them true and some of them false). Two chairs in the front of the class (the true and the false chairs). The class is divided in two teams and put in two lines. When the teacher read one sentence, one player from each team must run and sit down choosing the true of false chair. The player who sits in the right chair is awarded with a point.
Advert
Ask the students in pairs to design a product thay would like in their life. In pairs they circle and explain their products.
Find a prop (a blanket) and in groups they must perform their advert for an invented product.
Rhyming words
Give the students say 10 simple words in groups they must find words that rhyme and write then down with the 20 words play fish.
Then give the students a song and ask them to invent another verse eg. We 3 kings
I feel … when…
Elicit all the adjectives (feeling words) from the students and write them on the blackboard. Students take it in turns to make sentences for example: “I feel... embarrassed when… I speak English in front of a lot of people.”
When all the adjectives are finished put the class into groups and give them 5 adjectives each on paper taken from the blackboard. The teams must then mime each adjective with the rest of the class guessing which feeling it is.
“This is a book … a what?… a book … a what? … a book … Oh a book!”
Concentration game that is more difficult to explain than to play. Everyone in a circle.
Teach this dialogue:
Person A: “This is a Book.”
Person B: “A What?”
A: “A Book.”
B: “A What?”
A: “A Book.”
B: “Ohh! A Book?”
Make sure that the group establishes a steady rhythm with this dialogue. Then the first person uses an actual book. After the line “Ohh! A Book?” player A passes the book to player B who then turns to player C on their other side and they repeat the dialogue. Practice around the circle once or twice and then introduce new objects. Put two objects in the circle one after the other to make it more difficult until every body is giving and receiving objects at the same time. This is great for building concentration.
All Change. “All those wearing…”
Simple game where everyone is seated in a circle and the leader stands in the middle. When the leader says "all those wearing blue change" everyone wearing the colour blue must change seats; the leader will also try to find a seat so that one person will be left without a seat standing in the middle. Start the game focused on clothing e.g. all those wearing jumpers change, then combine items of clothing with colours, all those with blue bras etc.
Alternatives: all those with two sisters, all those with a dog, all those who like pizza, all those who have been to Benidorm.
Tongue twisters
Run through some old favourite tongue twisters in English and in Spanish (if you like)
Give the students the format of writing the twisters and get them to write their own.
Format -
Name
What they did
When
Where
Why
e.g. Bob built a boat in Bali on his birthday because he was bored
Big fish little fish
Big fish (small action) goes round the circle and little fish (big action) changes direction).
Waiting room
In teams arrange different symptoms of illnesses each person enters alone and passes each illness onto the other players so at the end all the players have one problem players must then think of a reason for leaving the waiting the room – no one sees the doctor.
Directors cut
Write a very simple dialogue from a scene from a book the class is studying choose players to act out the scene with a director (teacher) camera man, assistant etc.
Power Station
Two teams of up to ten players line up in front of each other. The quiz leader and a helper stand at either end of the two teams. The quiz leader decides on the subject or topic based on categories, say, types of fruit and then says a name. The name could be true or false. The team that first identifies that a given name does (or does not – depending on how you play it) belong to the category must all join hands, raise their arms and shout ‘ELECTRIC!’. To win the point it is not enough for just one person to get the answer right, it must involve the whole team.
Bunny bunny bunny
In a circle players form animals in threes for example a bunny with one person in the middle, making the face and paws and the other 2 forming the ears. This action is sent across the circle to be copied by 3 other people.
Other forms – elephant, plane, kangaroo etc.
Zip, Zap, Zoom (warm-up)
This is another motion around the circle warm-up. In this warm-up one of the players points to another player to one side of them and says 'zip'. That player turns to the next player in the circle, points to them and says 'zip'. Thus the 'zip' zips around the circle in one direction. At any time a receiving player can say 'zap' to the person pointing at them. When they do the player that said 'zip' and was pointing at them must change direction of the pointing. This means that they must quickly turn around, point and say 'zip to the person that just pointed at them. Now the 'zip' can zip around the circle, but changing direction every time there is a 'zap'. Lastly the person that receives the 'zip' may elect to yell 'zoom' and point at someone anywhere in the circle. That player then restarts the 'zip' going in the direction of their choice. The group must really pay attention for this to work
Superheroes
In groups players must invent new superheroes to protect themselves against an alien invasion. They must have a name that correlates with the first letter of their name (strong Simon), a special power with a stance and a noise. All the powers of the group must complement each other
Songs
3 blind mice.
5 in the bed.
Hokey Cokey.
London’s burning
Molly Malone
My bonny lies over the ocean
Boogie woogie washer woman
We 3 kings
Today’s Monday
Grand old Duke of York
Row row row your boat
One finger one thumb
I know an old woman
Doe a deer
Rudolph the red nosed reindeer
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