The Stew 2002-2003

On the spot - various activities
Warm-up Elementary Junior High High School All lessons Home
Maru/Batsu:  Give the students some information orally.  Via conversation with your JTE, explanation, puppet show, drama, video, ect.  After the information is given, test the students using a standing human true and false quiz.  This is also fun with trivia or current events.  Example, there are 8 planets.
1.  Give info on Halloween, seasonal activities, strange food, anything....
2.  All students stand.
3.  You give a true or false statement regarding the information stated.  example, Halloween is on October 13.
4.  Students make a Maru or circle with their hands if it is a correct statement or cross or Batsu if it is false.
5.  If students are wrong they have to sit down and the last student standing is the winner
Reverse Criss-Cross:  This is played like Criss-Cross but you provide answers and they must make the question.
ALT:  I am 24 years old. Student:  How old are you?
ALT:  I like pizza. Student:  What kind of food do you like?
Emotional ABC's:  Brainstorm some emotions or feelings.  It might help if you draw some faces on the board.  Then together chant with ABC's using different emotions.  Angry  A  B  C ect.  Sometimes I will split the class in half or third's with different emotions.
BEEP!!! This is a great review of numbers and can be used in many ways. 
1.  Practice counting patterns with your students, from simple 1,2,3, to 100, 200, 300 or days of the month, the first second, third.  January, February, ect.
2.  Each person counts out loud down the rows.  1,2,3,4.  But the students can not say a divisible of a chosen number, for example 4. 1,2,3 BEEP, 5,6,7, BEEP.
3.  If the students can not be heard, is too slow, incorrect, or forgets the BEEP the game starts over.
Count Off:  Each student has a student #.  Sometimes I have them count off so they can easily recognize their English number when I call on them in class.  For a change they can also Count down.  40, 39,38 ect.
Row Questioning: Give the first student in each row a question.  He/She must stand up and ask each person in the row that question.  This gets the whole class talking.  (You can also practice the questions and answers first if it is new material.)  Counting with the 2nd person in the row ect...
Example:  Do you like winter? Answer:  Yes.  Why?
Example:  What is your favorite _____? Answer:  _______________
You can also restrict their answer in that they can not answer the same as someone else in their row.  It must be original.
Word Association:  Students in groups practice word vocabulary.  Simply give them a theme and in a circular order students play word association.  Example:  Winter:  cold, skiing, mountain, snow, kotatsu.  You must stress that any association is OK.  About 1 minute a theme is ideal.
What is in the bag?:  This is done as a row race.  Give each row an object such as a flag or marker.  The student with the flag raises their flag and asks a Yes/No question about the object in the bag.  Is it hard?  Is it larger than ___?  Is it used at school:  You answer Yes/No.  The students can the pass the flag to the next person in the row.  The flags add pressure to the students and they actually muster up the courage to ask a question.  The row which guessed the object is the winner.  Try toilet paper, it's fun!  As time goes on you can teach them to narrow the questions, ex.  Does it cost less than  ______.
20 Questions: When using people, the JTE is a great resource for this game, as they know a whole lot more about famous Japanese people.
Board Shittori: Divide your chalkboard into the # of rows and write a word at the top of each division.  Give the first person a piece of chalk.  They must race to the board and write a new word using the last letter of the previous word.  Then they pass their chalk to the next person.  Example:  Tooth brush ...hair...radio...orange ect.  To make it harder you can put rules on the words.  Example:  They must be 6 or more letters, nouns only, winter words, ect..,  They first row done wins.
Sentence Board:  Like above but the students must make a sentence.  The...cat...ate...a... red...mouse.  You judge which sentence is the best.  It is also useful if you let them insert adjectives.  For example after the sentence is written I play a second time using the same sentence but they must insert descriptions like... the black angry cat quickly ate a red ugly mouse.   Of course the board games can also be done orally and work great.
Face Drawing:  A little hard for low level students but great for high school.  Give students a piece of blank paper and tell them to follow your instructions.  Don't tell them you are drawing a face.  Example:  Draw a circle in the middle of your page.  In the center of the circle draw another circle (nose).  When you are finished the instructions have some students draw their faces on the board.  ha.. ha.  Then draw the face you instructed.  If you have time it is good to review the prepositions.
Musical Box:  While playing music the students pass around (randomly)  a box filled with general conversation questions and an object such as a flag.  When the music stops the student with the box must ask the question to the student with the flag.  This is a good way to review.
Sing-A-Song:  Teach them one of your childhood favorites.  Give Old McDonald a try!  How about the Hokey Pokey, Someone Stole the Cookie.  It is best to write the lyrics on the board or hand out.
I Went Camping But I Forgot: Will I wrote, "Last Saturday I went camping but I forgot ...."  on the board and the first person (group of 10-12 third grade JHS) said....
Last Saturday I went camping but I forgot my... tent
Next person:  Last Saturday I went camping and forgot... my tent and my shoes
Next person:  continues making sentences.