Participle Phrases Alphabet Book

Every year my Advanced I students learn participle phrases.

Part of them practicing is to create a children's alphabet book using participle phrases (e.g. A is for Alligator: Looking beautiful in her tutu and ballet slippers, the alligator danced across the floor..)

In an effort to get my students to see that their work is about more than just a grade, I had hoped to send copies of the book to other teachers who could read it in their class. No cost would be present for teacher other than promising to send back pictures, letters, drawings or videos from their class so my students could see that their assignment did affect others.

This would not happen until the fall (probably November, but maybe October).

The book would NOT be anything professionally made. If I can get school approval for some budget, it will be bound with wire binding. If not, it will be stapled. Illustrations will probably be drawn by the students.

If you are interested please let me know by filling out the following form:



If you have any questions please leave a comment below.

Thank you so much for your time!

Baby Shower Games in the EFL class?

No I am not expecting! I was planning a wedding shower for a friend a while back and I mainly fell back on my teaching knowledge of random games to amuse the guests. So when I was scrolling through free kindle books and found this I thought, "You know, I bet baby shower games would be great in some EFL classes!" Some of them were, and others... not so much. Here are a few of the ones I think I could use in class.

Feed the baby: Great for beginning EFL students (I'd say A1 or A2) learning about food. Think of it as a specified Simon Says. One student volunteers to be the baby (or the teacher starts). The baby starts shouting out random vocabulary. For example, the baby says: "Broccoli" The parents, the rest of the students, have to decide if it is edible or not edible. If it is edible they clap twice. If it is inedible they cover their mouth.

Baby: Broccoli
Parents: Clap twice
Baby: Bread
Parents: Clap twice
Baby: Shoes
Parents: Hands over their mouth

If a parent messes up and does the wrong motion they are "out" and should sit down. Start out slowly but speed up eventually. This should help students recognize food words. The last student standing becomes the baby.

This can also be done with flash cards! While I think this works well with food, you could easily lose the baby and parent scenario and use it for colors or rooms in a house. For example the topic could be "Things we find in a kitchen" Two claps would be: Knives, Drawers, Microwaves. Hands on your mouth would be: bed, toilet, etc.


What animal is it? Take a shoe box and put a hole in it. Put an animal cracker in it. Have the student put their hand in and describe it. Can they guess the animal? Great for adjectives (rough, tiny, bumpy, etc.) and animals! You can use a puzzle piece or small toy if you want to avoid food (or have to because of allergies or school regulations. Alternatively put things in plastic Easter eggs and have them describe and guess. Probably best for Primary or Pre-K.

Who is it? Finally an easy ice breaker. Hand each student a post it and have them write three facts about themselves on it. Put a number on it and place them around the classroom. Have students go around with a student roster and guess who is what number.

Name Game! Probably the hardest (I think). Either give all the students a name (your name, a mascot name a celebrity name, a main character's name, an author's name, etc.) or let them use their own. Have them make a sentence with each letter starting a different word, so: Carissa Create Awesome Relics Inviting Super Stars Around. To make it easier have each letter start a sentence: Clearly you are special As such you should be careful. Really think before you decide to do something. If you do that, then your life should be awesome. Should you not follow those directions, things may end badly. So you've been warned. Act cautiously and you'll love life!

So those are just a few ideas from this book. Have you ever been to a baby shower? What's your favorite game? Would you use it in the classroom or keep it away from EFL?

5 little Pumpkins (family version)

A family of pumpkins sitting on a gate.
The mommy said, "Oh, my it's late!"
The daddy said, "I don't care!"
The sister said, "There are witches in the air!"
The brother said, "Let's run away!"
And the baby said, "Boo! It's Halloween. Yay!"
Then Whoooooosh... went the wind,
And out went the light!
And the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight.

I know the original version is different (and great for ordinal numbers), but this was my Halloween adaptation when I taught preschoolers English(EFL for some ESL for others) in Spain.

If you aren't interested in my version and only came here looking for the original there are several books you can look into

Some people consider this a song, others a poem, and still others a fingerplay. I like to think of it as a song, but really it doesn't matter what you call it! If you aren’t familiar with it check out the YouTube video above the hand motions are great, and they LOVE the Boo!

My students ADORED it, and it was a fun review of family members. You could teach it several different ways, but this is what I did.

1.      We started class normally with the Hello song, and we reviewed our emotions (happy, hungry, sleepy, etc.). I introduced a new emotion, scared!

2.      We did quick flashcards of the family to review and I showed them the pumpkins. I asked which pumpkin was the baby? Which pumpkin was the mommy? Etc. Then we quickly cut out each pumpkin (by quickly I mean we cut out the pumpkins as squares, not as circles). Each student wrote their name on the back so the pumpkins didn’t get confused later (and to get them to practice their letters again).

3.      I drew a gate and a witch on the board and we learned the words.

4.      I said the five little pumpkins song and each time I said a family member I held up my pumpkin and had them hold up theirs.

5.      Then we repeated the song, line by line. I sang it, they repeated.

6.      I selected 5 students to be the pumpkins they would come up with one pumpkin family member and we would sing the song. They would hold their family pumpkin in their air when we said their part. (Repeat until all students who want to can come up to the class and be a pumpkin)
7.   As long as they enjoy the song and you have fun keep going! It is really great practice and repetition is key at this age.

8.      Review colors (What color is the sky? What color is a pumpkin? What color is grass?)

9.      For older (my four and five year olds) students they colored their pumpkins and then pasted them to the gate paper. My younger students (the three year olds) were divided, some cut, and some just colored a pre-made page (the last one in this packet)

10.  For fast finishers I also put a witch, some bats, some grass and the phrase, “Happy Halloween” that they can cut out and paste to the picture

Here are some sample worksheets should you choose to use them.

Five Little Pumpkins

This is another easy example of how to use something that already exists and tweak it for your class. You could change this to review animals (5 different animals sitting on a gate, the bird said etc.), colors (the blue one said), adjectives (the small one said), jobs (the doctor said), and SO MUCH MORE! Get creative, and use this song for whatever works best for you.

Have you tweaked a song and had it work for you? Or do you have another activity you like for the 5 little pumpkins? Let us know in the comments

I had the honor to guest blog a Springtime version of this read more about that http://eslcarissa.blogspot.com/2013/03/carissa-guest-blogging-efl-preschool.html

FLY SWATTER

Flyswatter is an easy no prep game best used to review vocabulary and popular with all levels of EFL students (though it is great for non-EFL too).

BASIC STEPS:

1. Write all the vocabulary on the board (if you have a smart board you can put it up that way).
2. The class is divided into two-four groups.
3. Each group sends one student to the front of the class.
4. They stand a meter and a half away from the board facing the class (their backs to the board).
5. The teacher calls out a clue this can be the word's definition, antonym, a visual clue (gesture/picture).
6. The students can turn around AFTER the teacher gives the clue.
7. They try to find the word on the board.
8. The first student to hit* the word gets the point for their team. *Traditionally this game is played with each student having a fly swatter, but I have also had students just slap with their hands or use a rolled up newspaper.
9. If none of the students hit the word, their group can help them by calling out hints; however, they can ONLY call out direction words in English (higher, lower, right, up, down, etc.)
10. Once the points have been given the students go back to their group and new students come up.
11. The game is played until everyone has a chance to play, or all the words have been used.

LOW LEVEL:

1. Instead of writing the word you can play this game with preschool students by drawing or posting up pictures (or just the colors).
2. Rather than giving clues the teacher will actually say the vocabulary word (or maybe something that is the color of the word).

SAME-SAME but different

1. Write the antonyms on the board and give students the vocabulary word instead of a clue.
2. On the same lines write synonyms on the board and use the vocabulary words as clues.
3. To make it more complicated you can use a mix of antonyms, synonyms and vocabulary words on the board.

DIRECTIONS

1. Use it JUST to review directions and not vocabulary words.
2. Pass out a list of words paired with random words, colors matched with numbers, very advanced words with their definition, etc.
3. Since the students won't have the list memorized they will need to be guided (up, down, left, right) by their group who has the answers.

This is a great game when you have some extra time in class, or if you teach somewhere that doesn't give you a lot of materials when you teach.

You'll learn the best ways to adapt it for your class. With some classes you have to make it so they can only hit one word and then the other teams get a guess before they can hit again (otherwise they'll just hit all the words randomly). Have you used the game? How would you adapt it?