It’s been approximately six years since I made the definitive decision to become a language teacher.

During those six years I have often either been enrolled in language classes, or have been teaching
language classes, or both. Nevertheless, what you see here is a product of much more than language
instruction. Since deciding to teach language, all of my teachers, notwithstanding their fields of
specialization, have taken on a dual role in my education. As a student, not only did I strive to learn the
material being presented, but I made a personal commitment to assimilate into my own teaching practices
the effective ways that the material was presented. If a teacher utilized an activity that I liked, or a
presentation that was effective, I stole it. This packet is partially a bi-product of over half a decade of
highway robbery. The activities and games that you’ll find in this packet have been pick-pocketed from
sociology, science, English, and even Shakespeare professors. But teachers aren’t the only source of
inspiration for a pedagogical thief. This packet also contains games and activities adapted from cereal
boxes, neighborhood parties, church outings, summer camps, board games, and family reunions. On
occasion I do give credit to game creators, some of which are even myself, but for the most part I’ve
considered everything you see here as “free-ware,” and I encourage all of you to look the other way and
do the same.

This packet contains 30 fun and effective language learning games that have been tried and proven
successful in my own Spanish language classroom. These activities have been categorized into the
following themes, listed in chronological order:
• 1 General Review Games: These games often utilize a format that is consonant with the employment of
vocabulary, grammar, morphology, syntax, communicative language use and cultural learning objectives.
Many of these games have been adapted to be “low affective filter” games that allow under confident
students to participate and feel validated without interference from highly competitive students.
• 2 Communicative Language Use Games: Although many of the games in the packet employ this
element, these games specifically center on meaningful communicative interactions amongst students, and
the use of target language structures.
• 3 Vocabulary Games: The activities in this category are quick and exciting games that teach students
vocabulary and circumlocution skills. These activities are often communicative.
• 4 Grammar Games: Grammatical concepts and structures are specifically focused on here, although they
too have been treated in many of the other activities. Different modalities of communication that employ
specific forms are stressed in this section’s games, and the widely untouched topic of syntax is even
included here.
• Appendix: Here you will find some of the materials that you will need to begin immediately
utilizing these activities in your own classroom.

Curtis Kleinman
Yavapai College Spanish Instructor—Prescott, Arizona
Phone: 928-776-2290
Email: curtis.kleinman@yc.edu
If you would like an electronic copy of this packet, please see my website:
http://curtiskleinmanspanish.wetpaint.com/page/Fun+and+Effective+Language+Learning+Activities or
http://tinyurl.com/spanishactivities.

This is a good game to use as a review for quizzes or tests. First make up short language tasks, equal to the number
of students in your class (if your class has twenty five students come up with twenty five short relevant tasks).
Tasks should be short enough to be accomplished in 30 to 45 seconds. Here’s an example of a language task I use:

Translate the following to Spanish: They are from Toledo.

Some tasks may be as simple as supplying the correct vocabulary word, or reading a short sentence in the target
language and answering a question about it. Then, print up each one of these language tasks on a piece of paper
and apply to it a number (in this case, 1-30). Finally cut each numbered task out and tape them to the tops of the
students’ desks, one task per desk. Students sit in a desk that has a language task on it, and number their paper from
one to thirty. Tell the students that when you say go, they will have 30 seconds (or 45) to complete the task that is
affixed to the desk in front of them. Turn music on to signal that their time with the first task has begun. Cut the
music signaling that their time has expired. Each student should write the answer on his or her answer sheet, and
when the time comes to move on to the next task, students should stand and move with their answer sheet to the
next corresponding number on their paper. The number on their answer sheet should always correspond with the
next numbered desk that they are sitting at. You may want to include a few free desks where a task is not given to
afford students a break or a chance to make sure that their numbering isn’t off.

Short speaking tasks may be assigned as well by linking two tasks. Task 18 may say, “Ask the person behind you
where he or she is from, in Spanish.” Task 19 would then read, “Wait for the person in front of you to ask you a
question in Spanish and then respond in Spanish.”
Cultural music can be played during this game. The teacher should lower the volume of the music to signify that
the time allotted for that question has expired. Once the students have changed chairs the teacher should raise the
volume once again.

This is a variation on Musical Chairs, and it can spice up any worksheet activity. The same idea applies as in
Musical Chairs above, but this time, instead of students moving from desk to desk, it’s the questions that move.
Just cut up the questions on any worksheet and hand them out, one question at a time to students so that every
student in the class has one question in hand. Give each student thirty seconds to answer each question and then
he/she must pass the question on to the person at his/her left, as well as receive a new questions from the student at
his/her right. This is an excellent way to ensure that students are working in class and using the time you have
allotted for a worksheet’s completion to the fullest. It also saves on photocopies, since each student writes the
answer on an answer sheet, the teacher need not create one worksheet for each student, rather, the teacher creates
one worksheet per class.

Named after its inventor, this is a good competitive game for students that are not competitive or are unconfident
about their abilities in the L2. It is a simple trivia game, where the teacher asks a question (this could come in
many forms, such as a verbal question in the target language that must be responded to on paper, or a sentence that
must be translated from the board) that students respond to on paper. The trick is in the ingenious scoring.
Students are divided into groups of four or five. One paper (or white board—which works extremely well if
available) per group is placed on the desk of one single group member and the question is presented. If that group
member answers the question correctly by her or himself the group gets two points. If he or she answers the
question correctly with the help of the group he or she gets one point for the group and if the question is answered
incorrectly, either alone or with the help of the group, the group gains no points. Students should write the answers
and then bring the answer up to the teacher who will then tally the team’s point total on a scoring sheet that the
teacher keeps. If groups are taking too much time to turn in their answers, an extra point should be given to
whichever group turns in their answer first, be that answer right or wrong. In this way, if a team member answers
the question correctly without help from his team, and he is the first to turn in his answer, he would then win three
total points for his team. {I will use both masculine and feminine pronouns in free variation throughout this work}
The teacher begins by drawing a football field on the board, similar to the figures below.

Fig. 1—Football Field with ball on Pirate’s one-yard-line Fig. 2—Football Field with ball on Dragon’s 25-yard-line
The class is divided into two large teams, and the teacher flips a coin to decide which team goes first. The team
that wins the coin toss, the Pirates, in this case, (the Pirates, in the case of Figure 1) will take possession of the ball,
starting on their own one-yard-line (the teacher then draws a picture of a football on the one-yard-line on the board,
[see Figure 1]). Each team will have one representative that will be asked to answer a question presented by the
teacher (questions can be lexical, grammatical, or even cultural in nature and can be answered orally or written long
hand, and can be answered in the target language or in the L1, all depending on the needs of the situation). The
team’s representative changes with every question. If the team’s representative answers the question presented
correctly the team will advance the ball up the field (represented by the teacher erasing the picture of the ball at the
one-yard-line and re-drawing it at the 25-yard-line). The team’s representative may receive help from his
teammates when stuck on a question, but a correct response with teammate help will only retain possession of the
ball, it will not advance the ball forward. Three non-advancements in a row will result in an automatic turnover.
However, if the representative answers incorrectly, the play is deemed a turnover and the other team will gain
possession of the ball and begin to advance the opposite way up the field. If a team scores a touch down they must
go for the extra point by first answering a question and then by making a basket in the trashcan from a distance
specified by the teacher. The team can opt at any time to attempt a field goal. The distance of the field goal is in
direct proportion to the difficulty of the question (the further the distance the tougher the question). Field goals are
made by first answering the question correctly and then by making a basket in the trash can (once again the distance
to the trashcan should be positively correlated with the difficulty of the question). This game is especially fun to
play during football spirit weeks.
The key to the success of this game is having plenty of questions that fit into four different difficulty categories.
When the ball is at a team’s own one-yard-line (as is the case for the Pirates in Figure 1 above), and they are
attempting to advance the ball forward, questions should be pulled from the easiest of the four difficulty categories
(e.g. “Please translate this word from English to Spanish” etc.). However, if the team is on their opponent’s 25-
yard-line and are attempting to score on the next play (as is the case for the Pirates in Figure 2 above), the question
should be pulled from the most challenging difficulty category (e.g. Please translate the sentence, “It has been
attempted but never completed” etc.) On the other hand, if the team is on their own one yard line and want to go
for a field goal, instead of advance the ball forward, they should also be presented with a question from the most
challenging difficulty category. Extra point questions should be pulled from the easiest difficulty category pile.

http://www.quia.com/cb/219557.html
Jeopardy is a wonderful game for teaching interrogatives because all of the answers must be given in the form of a
question. Obviously the game can be played utilizing any one of a myriad of themes. The link above shows a good
example of an on-line jeopardy game, created with the use of the jeopardy creator program, Quia. This particular
jeopardy game is centered around food vocabulary and grammar, but jeopardy is also a wonderful medium for
introducing cultural questions (e.g. “According to the video we saw, this is the most effective way to get around in
Buenos Aires.” Answer: “What is the subway?”). This on-line version can be played with two teams and an LCD
projector, but a poster board with categories written by hand is just as effective.

This information gap game is especially effective because it is based so integrally in authentic real life experiences
that are goal oriented. Groups of two students are given two different week long planner’s that contain their
“schedules” for one week (I use a weekly scheduler print-out from Microsoft Outlook). The weekly planners tell
each student what they are doing on a given day for a one week period. Each planner is complete with real life
activities (e.g. study sessions, work, class, sporting events, etc.). The students are then told that there is a play in
town that they both want to go to see together, but they are both very busy. Luckily the play has showings every
day of the week both in the morning and afternoon. The student must find a day (or days) and time when they can
attend the play together.
I call this game “Dance Cards” from stories my mother used to tell me about high school dances. She said the week
prior to a dance she would walk around school with a dance card and young men would offer to sign her card,
signifying that they had pledged to dance with her at the event. In this game students are also required to obtain the
signatures of their classmates. This is a good game to encourage students to interact with new groups. First
students write five questions down in the target language on an index card, leaving space for a response between
each question. Depending on the level of the students these questions can be made up, translated off the board from
English, or you could just give the students these questions written in the target language on the board and students
can simply copy them to their index cards. Students must then arise from their desks and ask five different people
to respond to the questions. If a student responds to the question in the affirmative, the asker has the responder sign
his/her card next to the question that was asked. Then on the card, below the original question, the asker uses the
name of the responder in a complete sentence, answering the original question. For example, if the original
question was “Who plays the violin?” and the asker discovers that John does. John would sign his name () next to
the question, and then under the question the asker would write, “John plays the violin.” Sometimes I allow
students to use themselves for one or two questions or require them to find two or three respondents for a given
question, which encourages them to use the plural verb conjugations as well.

Next, students go back to their seats and trade cards, with a neighbor. The neighbor then reads the signatures and
confirms that the signatures are not forgeries by going and asking the author of each signature the same original
question that he or she has autographed. If the signature is confirmed by the student, then the question is marked
correct, if the signature is a forgery, the question is marked incorrect. Give points for this assignment based on the
number of correct answers.

The teacher hands out four different sets of picture files containing pictures of various products (food, clothing,
etc.) to four different students (one set of picture files per student). The teacher then proclaims that the four chosen
students will be “sellers”. The teacher then distributes an equal amount of fake money (especially good to use a
foreign currency like pesos, or euros) to each of the students who have not been designated as sellers (for examples
of foreign currency see appendix). The teacher then proclaims that the rest of the students are buyers. The sellers
arrange the pictures of products that they have been given in an aesthetically pleasing manner—as much as
possible, given the circumstances. Then the teacher tells the students that the buyer who gets the best bargain, and
the seller that makes the most money will receive a prize. The students practice with interrogatives, with the
common cultural practice of bargaining, and with using pertinent vocabulary (usually the products that they are
buying). By changing the currency to something like soles, sucres, or bolivares, this game turns into a larger
number learning game. Now products cost thousand or hundreds of thousands, instead of double-digit prices.
Make sure that the sellers have plenty of change :0)

This a great game for reviewing numbers and for utilizing the language and monetary currency system in a real life
context. The teacher holds up (transparencies also work well or LCD projector images are even better) pictures of
products that are “up for bid”. Students have been given variable amounts of money (some have hundreds of
dollars while others have much less). The object of the game is to make the best purchase for your money.
Students will bid on an item that interests them while trying to “win it” from their peers who are also bidding on the
item. Each time the price augments and a given student bids on the item the student who makes the bid must state
the amount of money in the target language that he is bidding for the product (great numbers practice). To make
this game more communicative give a short preview of the next three products that will come up for bid before they
are actually bid upon and allow students to converse about them in small groups (often students with little money
will want to pool their money and share the product). After all the products have been sold, students (or groups of
students) can present what they have purchased, after which the class will vote on which group or individual
received the best product for the money spent.
Note: I also like to use alternative currency systems such as colones in order allow students to practice using much
larger numbers.

This is probably my all time favorite game and is great to use with direct or indirect objects and even with
demonstrative adjectives. Bartering is still an important part of daily life for some developing countries and even
for countries that are developed but have faced economic setbacks causing scarceness of jobs and products. In this
game, each student brings one item from home that he/she is, and I can’t stress this aspect enough, . In an effort to
make this game as authentic and fun as possible, students will actually barter with their classmates, trying to
improve upon the item that they have brought to class with them that day. A student with a Twinkie for example
may approach another student with a Chocodile and say, “If you give me that, I will give you this” using either
direct and indirect objects and/or demonstrative adjectives (both of which are complex constructions in Spanish and
many other languages and therefore benefit a great deal from repetitive practice as in this bartering exercise). Then
the student that has received the barter proposal will then decide if he/she wants to trade or if he/she would rather
hold on to what they have, if the response is the latter then the two part ways and search the class for new bartering
partners. Students are encouraged to barter as much as possible, in constant search of an even better item. After the
students have had time to solidify their item of choice (e.g. obtain and hold onto the item that they most desire) the
students will present their new treasures. It is sometimes interesting to see how many times and item has changed
hands or who is the best barterer (one student went from a paper clip to a box of Uncle Ben’s Spanish Rice Blend).
Food items work well for trading, but I’ve seen items such as rubber duckies, play dough, and bubble bath become
highly circulated and sought after.

Have students bring one wrapped present to class. Put all of the presents in the center of the room (preferably
under a tree of some sort) then choose a student to select a present and open it. The next student should open a
present or “steal” the present that student one already opened. Student three should do the same. Beginning with
student six, each student should “steal” a present from another student. Once a student has his/her present stolen he
must open a new present. Presents can only be stolen three times, after which they are frozen and belong to the
current possessor. When stealing a present from another student the thief should articulate what he/she is doing.
For example, “I’m taking it from you” (“ estoy quitando”). This is a great way to practice using indirect and direct
object pronouns together. Once all the presents have been opened and frozen, the teacher should talk about the
presents themselves, where they came from, etc. For example, “Julio, who took those from you?” (“Julio, ¿quién te
los quitó?”).

This game is great for working with interrogative words and interrogative sentence structure. In addition, I love
this game because it helps everyone in the class come to know everyone else, creating a safer learning environment.
The teacher either asks students to create a list of ten “get to know you questions” in the target language or the
teacher supplies these questions on the chalkboard or projector. Then chairs are arranged in two rows in a way that
allows each student from one row to be staring eye to eye with another student from the adjacent row. Students will
then have a fixed amount of time (I use one minute and thirty seconds as delineated by an oven timer) to get to
know the other student by asking the ten questions. In this case one student asks all the questions and the other
student gives all the answers. The student that asks the questions makes brief notes to remember the information
for each question. When the timer sounds, all the students that compose the “questioning row” stand up and move
one chair to their left, and by so doing they are now staring eye to eye with a new student and the process begins
anew. After a given number of rounds the rows switch and the students who originally responded to the questions
now have the opportunity to be the interviewers. After a fixed period of time, the teacher calls on a student at
random, and without reading the name of the interviewee, the student reads a description of one of his interviewees
based on the ten questions that were asked. Then the class tries to guess which member of the class the student is
describing. Another variation is that before the student reads the description, all students stand up. If the
description that the student reads (as in, “This student has a very large family”) does not apply to a standing student
then he/she sits down. This process is continued until the entire class is sitting, save the student being described.

This game is similar to the Hasbro game Catch Phrase, and is an innovative way to help students practice and
develop circumlocution skills. There are many variations of this game; I include the format that works best for
large groups. The teacher divides the class into two groups and calls one representative from each team to come up
to the front of the room. The teacher hands one representative a pile of flash cards with vocabulary words written
on them, as well as their English equivalent. The student must now describe to his team the first vocabulary word
on the flash card without actually mentioning any of the words written on the card. Depending on the proficiency
level of the class the teacher may allow students to describe the target language vocabulary word in English, just as
long as they do not use the English equivalent that is also written on the flash card in their description. High
proficiency students will be able to describe the word in the target language. The teacher may choose whether to
allow facial expressions and/or hand gestures. The teacher gives each team representative one minute to describe
as many words as possible. One point is earned for every word that their team guesses correctly. The teacher keeps
a tally of the cumulative score of the team and chooses a winner after every student has had the chance to describe
for the team. Dividing the class into smaller groups when possible is best to give each student many opportunities
to describe the vocabulary words.
This game is based on the popular Scattergories game by Hasbro. The teacher tells students that they will have
thirty seconds to write down as many words as they possibly can in thirty seconds (the teacher can give more or
less time if desired) about a particular vocabulary theme that has been studied in class. For example “food.”
Students will now write, for the next thirty seconds all of the words they can think of that are related with food.
Once the thirty seconds are up, the teacher will have the students count their words. Then, the student who has
written the most words is asked to read his list. While he is reading, the other students read through their lists
silently as well. The student continues to read his list until another student in the class raises her hand, indicating
that she also has the same word that has been read. In this case, when two or more students have written the same
word everyone that has written that word must mark the word in question off of their lists. This word does not
count for points. Only original words that other students have not written count for points. When the reader has
finished reading his list the teacher will ask the class, “Are there any other words out there that Tommy hasn’t
read?” Other students will then read their differing answers and the process is repeated; the whole class eliminates
repeated (i.e. non-original) words from their lists. Then the class re-tabulates their word lists, counting only the
original words that have not been crossed off. A winner is now selected, based on this new tabulation. Now that
students know how to play this game, the teacher should divide the class into smaller groups. In smaller groups the
students are now prepared to direct their own thirty second games, as this game is best played in groups no greater
than ten. Once smaller groups have been created, the teacher only functions as the time keeper. In this game it
pays to 1) remember a lot of vocabulary words, and 2) remember the less common or often forgotten words in a
vocabulary list.
Another effective way to play this game is to give each student a transparency and an overhead projector pen. In
this case, students would simply bring their lists to the front of the room and place them on the projector, while the
other students in the class compare their lists with the list on the projector screen.
In this game the teacher requires each student to stand. Then the teacher describes a vocabulary word in the target
language. For example, if English were the target language and the vocabulary word in question were “apple,” the
teacher might say, “This is a fruit that grows on trees, and is often red or green.” The students raise their hands
when they have mentally guessed the vocabulary word. The teacher then calls on the student who was first to raise
his/her hand. This student guesses. If she guesses correctly, she has earned the privilege to sit down. If the student
guesses incorrectly she remains standing and the teacher describes another vocabulary word. This game is a
wonderful motivator for students who try to avoid studying their vocabulary, because no one enjoys being the last
student standing while the rest of the class looks on at them, wide eyed. This game can also be done with a teacher
pointing to a transparency picture that contains objects that are vocabulary words (e.g. a transparency picture of a
classroom with rulers, desks, chairs etc.).
The teacher creates a transparency with vocabulary words scattered in a way that gives the illusion of large
horsefly-like vocabulary words all over the projector’s screen (or blank white wall) when the projector is turned on.
The teacher divides the room into two large teams and indicates that the students must sub-divide these larger
groups into many smaller groups, composed of two members per group. Now, each group of two should have one
member turn his back to the projector screen, while the other member stares directly at the screen. The teacher
points to a specific word on the screen, “milk” for example, indicating to the student that can see the screen that
“milk” is the word to be described. The student then describes the word “milk” to his partner without ever actually
using the word “milk” (e.g. “It’s a white liquid, that comes from cows”). When the student’s partner guesses the
word, he then leaves his seat, grabs one of the two fly swatters sitting next to the projector and tries to find the word
“milk” on the projector screen. If this student swats and kills the vocabulary word “milk” before a representative
from the other team, his team will get a point. Only one representative from each team can be at the screen at a
time (fist one to the fly swatter gets swatter’s rights), however, every student who originally had his/her back to the
screen, and has since guessed the correct vocabulary word based on his/her partner’s descriptions, will then be able
to turn and look for the vocabulary word in question and shout directions to their team’s representative at the
screen. Students should be careful not to give away the word’s location to the other team however. After
describing the word to their partner, the students who were originally facing the screen should remain silent.
This game is also wonderful for practicing cardinal directions. The teacher replaces the word/housefly
transparency for a transparency South America and now the describing partner must describe where the country is
located, utilizing cardinal directions, and never explicitly mentioning the name of the country to the partner.
The teacher writes vocabulary words on mailing labels one per label and puts them underneath the chairs of the
students before they arrive in the classroom. The teacher tells the students to remove the label from beneath their
chairs and to (politely and gently) place it on the back of another student in the room without showing that student
the word that is being placed on her/his back. Then the students stand up and ask “yes” or “no” questions in the
target language to find out what word is on their back. For example, if the vocabulary theme was “food” and I
unwittingly had the word “apple” on my back, I might ask, “Is it a fruit?”, “Is it red?”, “Is it an Apple?” Once
students have guessed the word that has been placed on their backs, they sit back down in their chairs. Then the
teacher tells the student to rise and place the word that was on their back on a different student’s back, and the game
starts again. This game can be played for many minutes, until the labels’ stickiness wears off.
This game is based on the popular Apples to Apples game from Out of the Box Publishing. The teacher divides the
class into groups of ten or fewer. Each group gets two decks of cards, one adjective deck (containing cards that
have target language adjectives from the present or previous chapters written on them) and one noun deck
(containing cards that have target language nouns from the present chapter written on them). Each group has one
dealer that deals out five cards from the noun deck to each student in her group. The dealer now begins the game
by being the “judge.” The judge grabs one card from the adjective card deck and reads the adjective out loud to the
group members. If the adjective were the word “horrible” the group members would look through their hand of
five cards for the noun that best combines with the word “horrible”. The judge then collects all of the played noun
cards from the group members and reads through them aloud, trying to decide which, according to her, best
combines with the adjective “horrible”. If the judge chose the noun “fish” (from the “food” vocabulary theme
chapter), then the person who played the card with the word “fish” printed on it, would receive the adjective card
“horrible.” The first team member to collect five adjective cards wins the game. The dealer then passes the noun
cards to the student to her left, who then deals out one more card to each group member so that each student always
has five noun cards in hand at all times. The judge draws another single card from the adjective pile, reads it aloud,
and another round of the game has just begun.
The “judge” role always belongs to the dealer. The dealer role rotates with each round. When a student is playing
the role of the dealer he does not play any of his own noun cards. If group members take too long to choose a noun
card to play, you might want to insert a rule to speed the game up—the last player to play a noun card, loses the
turn, and must remove his card before it can be considered for selection by the judge, thus removing his opportunity
to win points in that round. This game could also be easily adapted to teach comparisons.
Usually text books are divided up into units of two or more chapters. This is a great way to merge vocabulary
topics from two or more chapters in preparation for a unit test. I will consider a chapter that focuses on “the home”
and one that focuses on “food” here. The class is divided into groups of five or six. The groups sit together in a
circle. The teacher gives each student in a group a number 1-5 and states that the game will begin with number
one, then two and so on. Number one begins the game by saying one thing that she eats and one place where she
eats it, (e.g. I eat a banana in the kitchen). Then, student two will say, “I eat eggs in the dinning room” and then the
third student will say, “I eat fish on the patio” etc. When one student repeats a place or a food that has already been
said, that student is out of the game. The teacher has an egg timer set as well, and whoever is talking in all the
groups when the timer goes off is also eliminated. Once there is only one member of each group remaining, these
members sit in a circle in the middle of the room and have a play off to find the ultimate champion.
With a little imagination this game can be adapted to a number of different vocabulary themes.

Finally, a way to use the classic elementary school game in the language learning classroom! Simply follow
“Heads Up Seven Up” rules. If you are not familiar with these rules, I explain here. Choose seven people from the
class and have them come to the front of the room. Tell the rest of the class to stick out their thumbs and put their
heads down on their desks and close their eyes. Then, the seven selected students will walk throughout the room
stopping only to push down the outstretched thumb of a classmate. Each selected student should touch just one
other student’s thumb. When all sevens students have touched a thumb, the teacher will cry out, “Heads up seven
up” and students will open their eyes and raise their heads. The seven students whose thumbs were touched will
stand and try to guess which of the seven students standing at the front of the room touched their thumb. Here is
the relevant part; instead of simply stating the name of the person that the student suspects, the student will describe
what the suspect is wearing in the target language. This is a great way to make using clothes vocabulary relevant in
the classroom.

This is a great way to see your students using the words from your vocabulary list. As the name suggests, this
works best if you have a document camera. First, make a pile of flashcards from your vocabulary list on 3”X5”
note cards. The vocabulary item written in the target language is all that should show on the front side of the card.
Then divide the class into two large teams. Each team should be composed of an equal number of players. If team
one has ten players then team two should have ten players as well. Then give each member of each team a number,
(in this case one through ten) so that each team has one number “one” one number “two” one number “three” and
so on. Next, start a timer that counts down from a minute or thirty seconds or some other desired time. Plop a
flashcard down on the document cam; choose a team to go first; start with number one on that team and have
him/her use the word on the flashcard in a sentence that clarifies the word’s meaning. For example, for the word
“maletero” a student might say, “Una persona que trabaja en el aeropuerto que lleva el equipaje y las maletas de los
pasajeros”. Once student number one from team one has finished giving his/her sentence, plop down another
flashcard. Now student number one from team two must do the same thing. Continue rotating from student to
student and team to team in this manner until the timer expires. If the timer expires while student number six from
team two, for example, is mid-sentence, then team one receives the point for the round. This is a great way to get
even reticent students involved and talking.

This game works best toward the end of a semester or academic year when you want to review all of the vocabulary
that you’ve seen throughout the duration of the class. Create a large pile of flashcards with all of the vocabulary
items written in the target language. Have students form groups of two and give them a stack of ten or more
flashcards. Instruct the class that one student will be the describer and the other student will be the guesser. Now
create some kind of bracket system (see appendix for example) on the whiteboard and fill it in, pitting one group of
two against another group of two, until all of the available brackets are filled in. (One team may get a “by” into the
second round depending whether you have an even or odd number of groups of two in the classroom). I like to use
sports brackets. NFL Playoff Tournament brackets are usually the best for classes of 25-30 students. Now, instruct
the describing students that they are allowed to use any word in the target language other than the word printed on
the flashcard to describe the vocabulary word printed on the flashcard. Instruct the guessers that they should try to
guess, from the describers descriptions, what word is printed on the flashcard. Once a guesser guesses the word
correctly, the describer will put the card aside and go on to a new word and begin describing once again. The
teacher will start a timer that counts down from thirty or forty five seconds and the students will all begin
describing and guessing words. Once the timer has expired students will stop, count the number of words guessed
correctly and report back to the teacher. The teacher will record totals on the whiteboard and advance winning
groups to the next rounds of action until a championship group has been determined. Every round the teacher
should collect, shuffle and redistribute flashcards so that each round every group is faced with new words to
describe/guess. This can be a fun way to review vocabulary quickly. Creating a tournament and tournament
brackets sparks a great deal of healthy competition.
In this game the class sits in a circle in chairs or desks. The teacher removes any desks that may be empty do to
absences or excess chairs from the circle. The teacher then approaches a single student and asks her, “Do you like
your neighbors?” If she answers, “No, I do not like my neighbors,” the people to her right and left must stand up
and switch chairs. As they do this the teacher who asked the original question must try to steal one of the
“neighbors’” chairs. If the teacher is successful, the person who is left standing without a chair must ask the next
question. He then approaches another student and asks, “Do you like your neighbors?” If this student answers
“No, I do not like my neighbors,” then the previous process repeats itself. If the student answers, “Yes, I do like my
neighbors,” then he must add another qualifying statement such as, “but I do not like people that wear skirts.”
Now, you guessed it, everyone in the circle that is wearing skirts must get up and exchange seats with someone else
while the person who asks the question races to steal one of their seats. The person who remains standing in the
middle of the circle, unable to find a seat chooses another individual and asks the questions again, continuing the
game. This game is wonderful for reviewing transitive indirect verbs like “gustar” in Spanish that seem to be so
problematic for English speakers. This game is also a good way to review clothing vocabulary.

This is a great game for teachers of languages that employ both past subjunctive and conditional tenses in if/then
statements such as Spanish. Students each write, on a small piece of paper or index card, an if/then statement. For
example, “If I were Scottish, then I would wear a kilt” or “If I had more self confidence then I would stand up to
my boss.” Then the teacher collects all of the papers and re-distributes them so that each student has an if/then
statement that is not his/her own. The students form a circle and the teacher indicates that a student should begin
by reading only the “If” part of his “If/Then” statement, after which the student to his right in the circle will start by
reading her “then” statement. The results are strange and humorous combinations such as “If I had more self
confidence then I would wear a kilt,” or “If I were Scottish then I would stand up to my boss.” The child who
started by reading her “then” statement would then continue the game by now reading her “if” statement, and the
student to her right would then read his “then” statement. Note: In order for this game to work the teacher must
supply the person. For example the whole class must write in either first, second, or third person (singular or
plural) all at the same time. If the teacher wishes the class to switch to second or third person (singular or plural)
the whole class must make this switch together.

The teacher start’s by saying “A” in the target language, thereafter the students are required, as a class, to continue
saying the A,B,C’s, (one letter can be said per student in large classes, two letters per student in large classes). The
difficulty of the game is that the students are situated in rows and are not allowed to look around at one another.
They must maintain a fixed gaze on the front of the room. Then they must spontaneously continue with the rest of
the alphabet, however if two students begin to say the same letter at the same time, “H” for example, the whole
class must start over again, with the teacher re-initializing the game by saying “A”. Students try to get to the end of
the alphabet, or to count to the number thirty or even to run through all of the conjugations of an irregular verb in
the past tense.

This game is an adaptation from the popular “cornering the market game,” PIT, by Parker Brothers, and one of few
activities that focus on building syntax skills. The teacher divides the class into groups of five. The teacher then
gives each group a different deck of cards that he has created. The composition of the deck of cards is vital in this
game. The teacher creates different decks of cards with one word in the target language printed on each card that
composes the deck. When the teacher creates each deck of cards he has at least one target sentence in mind, “I play
cards at night” for example. In this case the teacher must create a deck composed of 25 cards, (five cards that have
the word “I” written on them, five cards with the word “play” on them, five with “cards” on them and so on).
[Note: Here the teacher can vary the game slightly by adding more or less players to a group. A group of 4 would
necessitate a deck of 16 cards, utilizing a target sentence four words long (e.g. “Do you use soap?”). In this case
the deck would have four cards with the word “Do” written on them, four with “you” written on them and so on. A
similar process would be followed for a sentence six words long or one of greater length.] Once each group
receives a deck of cards, the cards must be thoroughly shuffled and each student receives a hand of five cards.
Using the first target sentence example, students may receive hands with the words, “I,” “I,” “night,” “at,” and “at”.
When trading is opened by the teacher, the goal of the game is to form a sentence using all of the words that they
have been dealt. Obviously this student’s hand does not form a sentence. When trading has been opened by the
teacher, each student can call out “one, one, one” to the partners in her group, signifying that she would like to trade
one card for another group member’s one card. If she would have said, “two, two, two,” the student would be
trying to trade two cards at a time, which would be a good move in this case since this student has two repeated
words, “I” and “at”. Once a student has formed a complete five word sentence in this case, he or she will knock
three times on his desk, signifying that trading has concluded. He shows his sentence and the group decides if his
sentence is correct or if trading should continue. If the student’s sentence is correct, he has won the game. The
teacher then might want to have a playoff with all the groups’ winners in the middle of the room, or simply rotate
the different decks of cards from one group to another, so that each group has a turn using all of the different decks
of cards (and thus, form all of the different target sentences). This is a great game to work with subjunctive as well,
contrasting sentences that employ subjunctive conjugations with those that employ indicative.
In this game, the teacher divides the class into groups of five or six. The teacher may give one initial situation to
each group written on a piece of paper or start the whole class out with a situation to build upon. For example the
teacher may say, “A pushy grandmotherly woman cut in front of me in line at the bank the other day. I was going
to say something but then I saw her approach the teller and pull out a gun. Then I heard the old lady say . . .” At
this point the teacher passes the situation off to the students, and in their groups they build upon the situation. Each
student adds one sentence to the story (passing one single paper around if the story is written, or just taking turns
talking if the story is spoken—in this case it is really fun to pass a tape recorder from person to person as the story’s
author changes). At the end, the groups read or replay their stories for the whole class to hear. Often this game
works best with more advanced learners, but it can be utilized with beginners if a time limit (e.g. 30 seconds per
new author) is enforced.
The key to this game is structure and creativity. The teacher must give an initial structured scenario that is
interesting and creative for the students to build upon. Students must be creative too, in order to make the stories
worth while. Without these two key components all too often stories slip into clichés: e.g. “A guy was walking
down the street when he saw a dog . . .” well you get the idea. I like to give a grammatical structure as well (e.g.
students may only use the gerund or –AR verbs etc.).
This is a simple game that can be done any time as a quick activity. Students write three statements about
themselves on a piece of paper in the target language. Two of the statements need to be falsehoods and one
statement must be true. After the statements have been written, the students stand and share their statements with
the class. The class guesses which statement is true and which statements are false.

This is a great way to teach superlatives and good way to get to know students at the onset of a semester. Give your
students a short survey about their favorite movies, foods, restaurants, books, etc. Make it mandatory or part of an
assignment to assure that students participate. After tallying the totals for each category, write down questions in
the target language such as, “According to our class, which movie that has been produced in the last five years is
the best movie?” “According to our class, which movie is the worst?” Have a large number of these questions
prepared with the breakdown of answers according to the Family Feud style point system (e.g. if the majority of the
class thinks Enchanted is the best movie [15 out of the 25 students in the class] assign the response, “Enchanted”,
five points; if only 8 of the 25 students thought that Finding Nemo was the best movie assign the response,
“Finding Nemo” three points; if only 3 of the 25 students thought that Pirates of the Caribbean was the best movie,
assign the response, “Pirates of the Caribbean” 1 point, in this way teams receive more points if they come up with
the class’ most popular answers just as in Family Feud). The teacher divides the class into two teams and asks one
team the questions he has prepared. If the team guesses the most popular answer (according to the student survey
given at the beginning of the semester) the team wins five points, if the team gives the second most popular answer
it receives just three points and so on, with the least popular answer receiving one point. If the team gives an
answer that was so unpopular as judged by the beginning of the semester survey such that only one or no members
of the class chose that answer on the survey, then the team receives one strike against it. Once a team has received
three strikes against it, the teacher will then allow the opposite team to begin guessing the answers to the
superlative questions. These superlative statements afford the teacher a great opportunity to teach the use of
superlatives. In addition, as a recap the teacher could use the beginning of the semester survey to teach
comparisons, as in, “Okay class, if you remember, according to your survey answers Nemo is better or worse than
Pirates?”
This game takes a lot of preparatory work (e.g. creation and tallying of the survey) but the information contained
therein could be used for many different activities.

This game helps you get to know one another and allows your students to utilize the present perfect tense in a
meaningful context. Each student receives three poker chips, sugar packets, Lifesavers or anything that you have
handy. One student begins by telling his three group mates, “I have never ridden a bicycle.” If any of the other
members of the group have ridden a bicycle then they give the student one of their poker chips. The goal is to
come up with as many things as you can that you have not done but that you believe that your other group members
have. Riding a bike is a great offering since most people can do it, but some cannot. After the class has been
playing for a few minutes go around the room and find the members of each group who have accumulated the most
poker chips. Then pull those players to the center of the room and have another tournament with these group
representatives while the whole class looks on and cheers on their group member. Lots of fun and a great way to
practice present perfect constructs.

You and your friend have been wanting to see a play that’s been in town for the last few weeks but your
schedules haven’t permitted it. You are both very busy and never seem to be free at the same time. This
is the last week that the play will be in town, and you have just called your friend to once again try to
arrange a time to go to the play together. The play runs for two hours and has two showings per day
Monday through Friday of this week. The matinee showing begins at 11:00 am and the evening showing
starts at 7:00 pm. Find a time when you can meet your partner at the play.

My weekly schedule:
Doctor’s Work: 2:00-6:30 PHI 101: 8:00-9:30 Work: 9:00-3:30
appointment: Work: 10:00-4:00
10:30-11:30 SPA 102: 5:00- EDU: 4:00-6:30
SPA 102: 5:00- 7:30
7:30
You and your friend have been wanting to see a play that’s been in town for the last few weeks but your
schedules haven’t permitted it. You are both very busy and never seem to be free at the same time. This
is the last week that the play will be in town, and you have just called your friend to once again try to
arrange a time to go to the play together. The play runs for two hours and has two showings per day
Monday through Friday of this week. The matinee showing begins at 11:00 am and the evening showing
starts at 7:00 pm. Find a time when you can meet your partner at the play.

My weekly schedule:
Pick up Linda: ANT 11:00-12:30 BIO 151: 8:30- GEO: 8:00-10:30 River Trip: Gary’s
12:15 Work: 3:00-8:00 10:00 ANT 11:00-12:30 Family, All Day
FRE 452: 1:00- Work: 10:00-4:00
3:30