Child's Play
Playing Games in the EFL Classroom!
|
This article is my thoughts and experiences based on over five years of teaching English to children. It's purpose is to to present some ideas on different aspects of using games in the EFL, ESL classroom which you may not have thought about. This page is also a work in progress. It will be updated as I have the time, energy, inclination and inspiration.
Playing Games
Why play games? Teaching is a serious business and games are something you do for fun. Which is exactly why you should play games with your students. They will made your classes fun. If the students are having fun they will find learning English interesting. And if a person finds what they are studying interesting they will absorb much more and retain much more than they will if they are only studying because they have to. Children are full of energy and like to be active. So why not use all that energy to a constructive purpose - the purpose of learning English. That's why I say, without hesitation, that games are the best way to teach children English.
When playing games be involved yourself. By being involved I don't mean that you should be the center of attention, that would only spoil the game. But you should always be somewhere on the periphery, keeping your eye on things and "cheering and jeering" at the appropriate places. If you put too much distance between yourself and the game the students will feel that you are bored and uninterested and will therefore become bored and uninterested themselves. The amount of teacher involvement should also depend on what you are trying to achieve. If you are practicing a new language item you may want to take a more participative role then if you are reviewing old material.
Time limits are very important. They are what makes the game interesting or boring. If a student is taking forever to answer a question then the other students become bored and lose focus. And when they become bored, well, as the old saying goes, "The devil finds work for idle hands." There are no hard and fast rules to setting time limits. They depend on the ability of the student and the difficulty of what you are trying to teach. There are different way of setting time limits. Some teachers like to use an "egg timer" or similar device and other teachers just 'count to three' in their heads. The main drawback of these and other such methods is that they aren't interactive. They don't allow for any form of student interaction.
I like to use what I call a countdown. Hold your hand up with your fingers splayed so the whole class can see it. Then count down from five closing off your fingers as you do so. You should only have as many fingers showing as the last number you said, eg.,
5 (showing five fingers)
The huge advantage in this system is that it gives the teacher a lot of flexibility in the amount of time actually given. The quicker students can have the challenge of a quick countdown and the slower students can get a bit of extra time to answer the question. This may seem a little unfair at first glance, but the students seem to understand and appreciate the idea. If the game gets really exciting you don't have to count the students will do it for you all you have to do is show the fingers.
You can also vary the time taken depending on the length of the answers. "Yes, I can", requires a lot less time to think of and then say than "I always ride my bicycle in the park at three o'clock on Saturday afternoon". With shorter answers you may want to use a three count instead of a five count.
It's also a great teacher check game after drilling a new language item. You start off with a slow count giving the students plenty of time to answer. Then, with each succeeding round, you dramatically shorten the time given. It's a great way to turn an otherwise boring exercise into an exciting adventure.
Start off with with a quite game and slowly build the excitement with each new segment of the class. Always end the class with an exciting game. If the students enjoy the last ten minutes they will forget about any boring bits that came before it. There is also 'parent politics' to think of. If they see their children walk out of your class happy and animated, they are happy. But if they see their children come out of your class bored and listless they will start to question your abilities as a teacher.
Although these aren't everybodies cup of tea they are something a teacher should give serious consideration to. By penalties I don't mean "sadistic, draconian punishments", just try to find a way to give the students a personal stake, however small, in the game. After all, what's the point of doing something where you neither gain nor lose anything. With competitive games this area takes care of itself. The student either gets the chance to score or they don't. But with non-competitive games, pre-game warmups, etc., this area needs a little thought. One way around this problem is to have the student "bet" their right to sit down. If the student fails to answer the question within the allotted time they must stand up. They get a chance to "win back" their right to sit down on the next round.
You have your favorite games, but occasionally you like to play something new or different. Your students are the same. You will have your mainstay games, the everchanging shortlist of games the students are always asking for. But it's always nice to have a couple of extra games in your bag of tricks.
You should always name the game. How can the students ask for a game if it doesn't have a name. Make the names short and easy to remember. The game itself is not the language lesson, it is what you are using to teach the language. For example, if you want to play 'snakes and ladders' just call it snakes.
Make a game of the scoring process itself. The more ways you can find of making the game depend on the students themselves the better. It makes the game far more interesting to know that the score depends solely on yourself. And if you are using something like "paper scizzors stone" to determine the score there's also the element of trying to outwit your opponent.
Add a way to get zero in the scoring process. To know that you have won this particular round and can still fail to score adds a lot suspense to the proceedings.
Have no set score. Find a way to have the students produce the score themselves. That's why I like scoring methods such as "Paper Scizzors Stone" or "The Finger Game" (see below). The students generate the scores themselves without reference to any outside resource.
There are many different ways to score points for games. Here are a few ways that I have used. This list is by no means exhaustive. The ways of scoring are limited only by your own imagination.
The simplest way is to give a point for each correct answer the student gives. I find this to be a pretty boring scoring system but it is sometimes useful when you want to quiet things down after a particularly rowdy session.
Have the student throw a die to get the score. It's easy to make your own die. A sheet of A4 sized light cardboard will give you a die of 6cm to a side. This is a good size. It's big enough to be seen easily by the whole class yet not too big to be held in little hands. You can either use the traditional method of numbering by using the numbers one to six consequetively, or you can add one or two zeros to make it more exciting.
Have the student cut a deck of cards and chose a card to get the score. The number cards give the score and the picture cards are zero. this is a good scoring system when you want to practice numbers. Have the students add the total up, in English, to find out the score.
Make up you own set of score cards. These can be as simple as cards with numbers on them to as complex as you want to make them. You may even want to add some negative numbers so that it's possible to end up with a negative total.
Play stone scissors paper. Paper is the flat opened hand, scizzors is the closed hand with only the index and middle fingers showing, and stone is the completly closed hand. Paper beats stone but loses to scizzors, scizzors beats paper but loses to stone, and stone beats scizzors but loses to paper.
Play the finger game. This is a game similar to stones scissors paper. The students display a number of fingers form none to five. Therefore, with two students, you get a a number somewhere between zero and ten. The way I like to do this is that if the number is over five take five away and the number left is the score. So six equals 1, seven equals two, eight equals three, nine equals four, and ten equals five. Zero, five and ten all equal zero.
^ - ^ - ^ - ^ - ^ 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 Flashcards are a great language learning tool. As the old saying goes, 'one picture is worth a thousand words'. But how do you use them effectively? Here are some of my ideas along that line. If you are using them to drill vocabulary start off by sitting in front of the class so that the whole class can see them easily and go throught the drill. After the students start to get an idea of what the cards are you can start to just flash the cards for a second and the students have to tell you what the card is. That's why they're called flashcards. As they become more familiar with them you can shorten the time of the flash. You can liven this process up by learning how to throw the cards up into the air so that they spin around and then catching them again. An added bonus of doing this is that when you mess it up and the cards end up all over the floor the kids get a good laugh. Another good reinforcing activity is to pull a card out from the middle of the pack so that only part of it is showing. The students then have to guess what it is. You can either put the card in the front of the pack and give another short drill if you think they need it or give the card to the student who was the first to guess what it was correctly. A variation on this theme for reviewing already introduced material is to give a short drill and then hold the cards so that they are facing you. The students have to guess which card it is you are looking at. If you are teaching actions (eg, running, jumping, go to the door, give me a pencil) have a student come to the front of the class and hold the card so that only that student can see it. This first student has to tell a second student what the card is and the second student has to do it. Then it's the second students turn to come to the front of the class. This activity can very easily be turned into a game with teams, points, etc. When you're drilling the cards and you think the students know it well enough to move on to the next phase casually throw the cards face down on the floor. The immediate reaction of the students nearest the card is to pick it up. Don't let them. Don't even let them touch it with their foot. When all the cards are on the floor point to a student and say the name of one of the cards. The student then has ten seconds to find the card hand it to you and repeat the name of the card. This is another activity that can be turned into a game. There are a couple of caveats to remember when using flashcards, though. One is that after you have been through the stack of cards a couple of times the students start to remember the order of the cards. They remember that this sound follows that sound and not what the card is. So after you have been through the cards two or three times shuffle the cards so that they can't do this. Another is that many cards come with the words of what the card is written across the top of the card. The more able students soon work out that it's easier to read the word rather than know the picture. As I want the student to concentrate on the picture I like to cover up the word for the picture with my fingers when I'm drilling the card. The reading can come later. Here are a few tips and tricks to make your classes more interesting. First off, remember that you are teaching kids. To keep their attention you will have to keep them amused. If you just sit there and talk like you would to a bunch of adults you'll soon lose their attention. Kids have lots of energy and like to be active and since most of the time you'll want them 'bums on seats' you'll have to be active for them. Prowl around the room making and holding eye contact with them for a second and then move on. Pick students at random when asking questions. If you just move around the room in an orderly fashion then the kids will only pay attention to you when it's their turn. Ask the question first, ponder for a second, then supply the students name. This will help to make sure that they listen closely to what you say. Try to keep their books closed. If you are trying to teach something and they have their books open they aren't listening to you, their attention is in the book. If you want to teach something, write it on the board. At times this may take you a short time as some conversational passages, etc. are longer than others. So if it's going to take you more than about five seconds to write something fire random questions at the students. You don't have to stop writing just randomly ask the students something. This will keep the students attention focused on you and stop them from mentally wandering off somewhere while you are writing. When doing a teacher to student activity try to find different ways of chosing the students you are going to interact with. One way is to stand in the middle of the room and spin your whiteboard marker on the floor. Whoever it points to is 'it'. Another way is to move around the room playing 'stones scissors paper' with randomly selected students. If you win then that student is has to answer the question or do whatever it is you are doing. If the student wins you move on to the next student. If you are reviewing old material before introducing something something new that expands on it, move around quickly the room two or three times firing questions at the students. Give them not time whatsoever to answer. They either have to answer straight away or stand up. This also makes a great filler exercise for those times when you finish what you wanted to teach two or three minutes early.
|
| O | O | O | O | O |
| If you have any comments, questions or suggestions feel free to email me at taiteach.geo@yahoo.com |