Original games for young learners

[samuel]

Hello, I am a trainee teacher at Laval university and I would like to have more ideas as to what fun and useful activities can be done with young learners of English as a 2nd language. Of course, there are many classics such as playing hangman or charades and songs, but I would like to know what activities you might have done yourselves maybe that really were a success with your young students. I will do my 3rd practicum in primary school in less than a year and I would like to start thinking bout cool activities that will truly motivate my young learners. I want them to have fun while they are learning one of the most important languages in the world! So, I'm waiting for your awesome ideas! I'm sure you have something interesting to share!

[buniac]

Hey!

Since I have a teaching young children class and we are currently working on a lesson plan intended for first and second grande learners. Our team has created an activity related to shapes, colours and numbers. We begin our small unit with a lecture of our story. We decided, for the first activity, to do a memory game according to the vocabulary they have seen during the story. For example, they would have to flip the two yellow stars that are in the memory game. For our second activity, they have to put parts of the story in the right order. This helps them remembering the story while focusing on vocabulary. You can always leave pieces in black and white and make them colour according to their interpretation. Finally, you can do a matching game with the colours you have seen in the story and things in your classroom. They will be happy to move around the class and be part of the activity.

[JEEPYY]

Hey dear Samuel, I have a few cool ideas you could use with younger learners! :D

First of all, the most important thing to do is to involve them! When they take part in something, they enjoy it much more and they learn it way faster. Also, they lose the feeling that they are on a second language class, which can be very stressful. How do you get them involved? Sing, play, dance, move, do the ninja, whatever! One thing we learned in teaching young children class is to let them participate in all of you things. Usually, a good trick is to read stories and exaggerate some caracter traits and things so that they wanna to imitate the exaggerations. They love that.

[cathjean]

Hi
I believe that songs and arts and crafts are the best way to keep your students interested. Have them move around the class and sing a song. They can even make puppets that are related to the song and then they can participate to the song with it. A fun activity that I made within my practicum is to have the students learn a song which involves action words. They can then sing and act the song at the same time.
It is fun and the fact that they are not sitted the whole class helps them forget they are learning.
It is the best way to have them play and learn.

[kdammers]

Instead of Simon Says, I use "Please." This teaches American/English culture as well as being shorter.

If the kids can read, make attachable name cards that You put onto their backs. On the cards, have names of characters all students know (depending on where You are and the age level, it might be Donald Duck, Batman, you, other students, the school mascot, and the president of the country, for example). The kids have to find out who they are by asking yes/no questions. If the kids can't read, use pictures instead (this can be expanded to fruits, animals etc.).

An activity I use at the college level (but low English ability) might work: After teaching descriptions (clothing and/or people), I send a boy and a girl into the hall-way with a project (e.g., to read a selection or draw a picture). While they are out, I have the students describe one of the two. This can be a list of attributes and/or a picture. Then i call the student back in, and have the student evaluate the description, with my prompts if necessary. Then we do the other student.