Octopus game
Vocabulary: octopus, fish, freeze, "swim across".
Materials: fish flashcard, octopus flashcard.
This is a game I found while browsing the internet. I find it works especially well with rowdy classes as they really get into the game. This game does not require kids to use a great deal of English nor does it even require every child to speak. The focus with this game is to get the kids to enjoy their English time.
At the start of the lesson I show the class the flashcards and drill the words fish and octopus. Then I draw a picture of one of the gym's basketball courts, specifically the outside lines and the center circle.
One student is chosen as the octopus and the rest are fish. The fish line up on one end of the court. The octopus stands in the center circle. When the octopus shouts "swim across", the group attempts to pass to the other end of the court. The octopus has a soft volleyball and attempts to tag or throw and hit the fish with the ball. Once a fish has been hit by the ball, they are frozen to the spot and become an octopus tentacle. On future rounds, the tentacles try to touch fish as they run past. If touched they too become octopus tentacles. The game ends when there is only one fish left. This fish becomes the octopus for the next round.
The octopus is the only one who is allowed to throw the ball.
To speed things up we sometimes also make the slowest fish to cross also become an octopus tentacle.
This game can last for a whole 45 minute lesson.
Comments (0) 30.11.2009. 18:34
Class pair game
I like ALT lessons that are versatile enough to use at a variety of age levels. My JTE teaching colleague introduced this game to me. She in turn was told about it by an ALT she used to work with. It may well be popular in some ALT circles but I hadn't heard about it before. It is perhaps a bit complex for younger students but I have played it with both grades 5 and 6 as one of our elementary lessons. It also works well at junior high school and can be used for a variety of vocabulary and grammar. This game can be used for between 20 minutes to a whole lesson if you are introducing new words.
I don't really have a good name for this game. We just refer to it as that game. It can be used to teach/reinforce any vocabulary or grammar you fancy. Using it at elementary school we were practicing fruits. At junior high it could be used for verb conjugation, etc.
Pre-teach: First we introduce the language we want the kids to use during the game. In our fruit lesson this simply involved us getting our realia and flash cards out. Once we'd practiced the vocab we moved into the game.
How to play: Students play this game in teams of two. Each pair sits together, e.g.
XX XX Last
XX XX XX
XX XX XX
XX XX XX
First XX XX
The aim of the game is to be the pair sitting in First position. Pairs get relegated to Last position if they are too slow in answering, too noisy when it's not their turn, or any other rule you can think of.
Playing with fruit, each group of tables is a particular fruit. So when students move, the fruit they call out changes too. The First pair starts. The student on the left calls out the name of their fruit in English. The other student calls out another fruit name in Japanese, e.g. orange - リンゴ. This puts the pressure on the apple group. The left apple student calls out apple and the right student of the pair calls out another fruit in Japanese. And so it goes on.
As mentioned above, if a group is too slow, too noisy when it's not their turn, calls out in Japanese when they should call out in English (or vice versa), calls out the name of a fruit that isn't in the game, etc. they are out and have to move to the Last position. Then all groups behind the group who is out move up one place.
The game continues in this fashion. You can extend things by having the students swap from right to left.
To use the game at junior high school, you could use irregular verbs for example. One side calls out the past tense of their verb and the other student calls out the present tense of the verb of another group, etc.
The elementary kids I have used this with get pretty excited about things. Our fifth graders were so noisy that we had to keep calling groups out for their rowdy behaviour.
I'll post some pictures in the near future showing the layout of our classroom.
Comments (0) 23.06.2009. 21:32
Heads down - Thumbs up
This is a game we used to play at primary school in Scotland. For the longest time it didn't even occur to me I could use it in Japanese elementary schools. Then, speaking to my cousin one day she mentioned that the kids in her class (she's a primary school teacher in Scotland) go mad for Heads down - Thumbs up. I realised that as it doesn't use too much English, children in Japan would be able to enjoy playing very easily during their elementary lessons.
In case you don't know the game. This is how I unsually introduce it to a class. Once the kids know how to play it is easy to skip straight to the game.
Start off with some Simon says and make sure to use the phrases, touch your head and thumbs up. Including Simon says into the lesson means both games will fill the 45 minutes nicely. I don't like to play more than 25 minutes of Heads down Thumbs up. About 20 minutes seems perfect as it leaves the kids wanting more.
Once they've got a handle on heads and thumbs I tell them we are going to play another game. TENSION UP!
We drill, heads down thumbs up. Starting with thumbs up and they do the action. Next, heads down and again do the action. They are usually puzzled but in a giggly kind of way.
We then have a volunteer at the front of the class with his or her desk and we have the other kids say heads down thumbs up. I help the kid at the front get into position and check that everyone knows what is expected.
Then choose between 1/5 and 1/4 of the class to be ghosts, monsters or whatever is in vogue baddie-wise. We are currently using ghosts.
The ghosts come to the front and say heads down thumbs up. Once the rest of the class are in game positon, I tell the ghosts to choose one while using my fingers to gesticulate ONLY ONE and do a thumb touching action.
It doesn't matter if anyone gets it wrong. As I haven't really explained the game to them fully it is kind of to be expected and I enjoy watching kids get it and then explain to their buddies what's going on.
The premise is that the ghosts must choose one person by squeezing someone in the heads down thumbs up position's thumbs. Then creep back to the front of the class. Then the ghosts in unison say, heads up. To which I add, if you were touched, while do a thumb squeezing action, stand up. After a few goes, the ghosts will say stand up instead of me.
Next, the people who were touched try to guess which ghost it was. The ghosts stay quiet until all the touched students have guessed. Then I say, stand next to the person you touched, again while using a bit of hand signal action. People that guessed right swap and become ghosts. While ghosts who weren't picked correctly have another go.
We limit it to three goes of being a ghost in a row. Any ghosts not picked after this become a champion ghost and are swapped out by the Japanese homeroom teacher. This is simply in an effort to make sure more kids have a turn.
That's it. Not too much English going on but I have kids from grade 1 elementary up to grade 1 in junior high buzzing for this game. It is a great ALT lesson in its own right and can be used as a filler if you end up with 10-15 minutes left at the end of a class (as long as they know how to play). The first time allowing a good half hour is probably best.
This game is also known as Heads Down - Seven up. However to me, Seven up is a kind of lemonade.
It's weird that kids can have so much fun playing a quiet game like this rather than playing with one of the latest toys of the moment like Zhu Zhu Babies or something similar!
Comments (0) 16.06.2009. 06:16