Games
Games help provide the balance you need in your lessons to keep your students engaged and motivated while
making learning meaningful. Not only do they promote communicative competence by reinforcing language
usage, they also help develop children’s social skills as they foster collective values. Furthermore, they serve
the purpose of “stirring up” a lesson after an activity which calms them down (settler). However, too many
games can also overexcite your students and lead to too much disruption. We can never lose sight of the great
language acquisition tools games are in an EFL context.
Bean Bag
• Place the flashcards on the floor.
• Ask for a volunteer to come to the front of the
class.
• He/She throws the beanbag and identifies the
flashcard where it lands.
• Ask for more volunteers.
Bend it!
• Stick the flashcards on the board.
• Ask for volunteers to come to the front of the
classroom.
• Tell each volunteer to stand in front of a flashcard.
• Call out each flashcard at random.
• Every time the student hears the flashcard he/she
is standing in front of, he/she should bend his/her
knees.
• Repeat the activity to get as many students as you
can involved.
Bingo
• Give each child a bingo cardboard or give them
one per pair.
• Shuffle your mini flashcards (make some more if
you don’t have enough).
• Take one of the mini flashcards and call out the
object on it.
• If the student identifies the object on his/her
cardboard, he/she must raise his/her hand and
repeat the name of the object.
• Either give them the flashcard or before you start
the game give each child a handful of tokens.
• Keep playing until they are able to fill the whole
cardboard.
• The student(s) who win should call out BINGO!
Charades
• Play it as a group or in teams.
• A member of each team is given an action and
they must mime it.
• The other team members guess what their
teammate is miming.
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Chinese Whispers
• Whisper one of the words/phrases/sentences that
have been taught into the ear of one of the
students.
• Have each student pass the “secret” message into
the next student’s ear and, once all the students
have heard the message, the last student must say
what he/she heard.
Fly Swatter
• Stick the flashcards on the board.
• Divide the class into teams.
• A member from each team comes to the front of
the class and stands by the board.
• Give each student a fly swatter.
• Call out one of the flashcards which are on the board.
• The first student to swat the correct flashcard with
the fly swatter earns a point for his/her team.
• Keep track of the score by writing the points on
the board.
• Invite other students from each team to play too.
• Try to involve as many students as possible in the
game.
• At the end of the game, count the points to see
who has won.
• Encourage students to count the points with you.
Four Corners
• Place a flashcard in every corner.
• As you place them, ask the students to identify
each flashcard.
• Tell students to stand up (two at a time, for
example).
• Tell students that you will call out one of the
flashcards and that they have to walk to the
correct corner.
Freeze!
• Put the flashcards in a pile and turn them over.
• Pre-teach the word freeze and tell students that
when they hear it, they can’t move.
• You can even play some music in the background.
•
• Students pass the flashcards (in a pile faced down)
around.
• When they hear the word freeze, they must stop.
• The student holding the flashcards turns the top
card over and identifies it.
• Students are not allowed to hold on to the pile of
flashcards for more than two seconds.
Human Pelmanism
• Tell students that they are going to play a different
version of pairs.
• Inform them that instead of using cards to play
the game, they will become human flashcards.
• Divide the class into teams.
• Choose four/five students from each team to
stand in a row in front of the classroom.
• Form two different rows.
• Whisper in each student’s ear the object they will
be.
• Remember, there has to be two of each object
(one in each row).
• In turns, a member from each team calls on two
students (one from each row).
• If they both say the same word, a pair is found and
that team earns a point.
• The pairs that are found can sit down.
• If the student calls out two students and they are
not a pair, they must stay in the same place.
• Remember, it’s a memory game so students must
remain in their place.
• The game continues until all the pairs are found.
• At the end of the game, count the points to see
who has won.
I Spy with my Little Eye
• Choose a category. For example, school objects.
• Ask a student to think of a (school object) and say
the following: I spy with my little eye something
beginning with the letter P.
• Students then have to guess what the object is.
Variation: You can also ask students to say: I spy
with my little eye something that you write with…
Kim’s Game
• Stick the flashcards on the board.
• Go over the vocabulary before you play.
• Tell students to close their eyes while you take a
flashcard away.
• Ask students to open their eyes and guess which
flashcard is missing.
• Tell students not to shout out the answer (or peek),
but to raise their hand and wait to be called upon.
Noughts and Crosses
• Draw the game on the board (two horizontal
parallel lines and two vertical parallel lines).
• Place one flashcard in each square.
• Divide the class into teams. One team will use the
noughts, the other the crosses. In order for
students to win a nought or a cross, they must say
the correct word(s).
• Of course, the aim of the game is to get three
crosses or three noughts in a row (horizontally,
vertically or diagonally).
Pelmanism
• Students should shuffle the mini-flashcards and
spread them out face down on their desks.
• Make sure that there are two of each.
• Taking turns, students flip over two flashcards,
and when he/she turns them over he/she must
state what he/she can see/read.
• If the flashcards are in fact a pair, he/she holds on
to them until the end of the game.
• If they are not, he/she turns the flashcards over
again. Make sure that students place them back in
their original position. Since it is a memory game,
students shouldn’t mix the mini-flashcards up.
• The game ends when all the cards have been
paired up.
• At the end, students count each pair to see who
has the most pairs.
Draw and Guess
• Divide the class into two teams.
• One member of each team (one at a time) comes
to the board.
• Tell students that you will show them one of the
flashcards and that they must draw what they
see/ read on the board.
• His/her team should have a time limit to guess
what he/she is drawing.
•
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 Games
• The team who guesses the most “pictures” wins
the game (the opposing team should control the
time limit, so they are given a task at the same
time).
• The team with the most points at the end of the
game, wins the game.
Sequence Game
• Stick the flashcards on the board in a row.
• Ask students to identify them all.
• Then turn over the first flashcard so you can’t see
the object and ask students to identify the object
you turned over.
• Continue to ask the students to identify the other
objects.
• Turn over the second flashcard and ask students
to identify the first flashcard then the second and
all the rest.
• Follow the same procedure until all flashcards are
turned over.
Simon Says
• Tell the children that they are going to play a
game called Simon Says.
• Tell students that they must do as Simon tells
them. E.g. Simon Says stand up. Students should
then stand up.
• Ask for volunteers to become Simon and give
instructions to the class.
Variation: Vary from using Simon Says and starting
the instruction with merely an imperative.
Students should only follow instructions if they
hear Simon Says. If they don’t hear Simon Says,
they are not allowed to do the action.
Stand up, Sit down
• Tell students that they are going to play a game
called Stand up, Sit down.
• Place two rows of flashcards where all students
can see them.
• Call out one of the flashcards by saying: This is a
(schoolbag).
• If it is in the top row, students stand up; if it is in
the bottom row, students sit down/stay seated.
Stepping Stones
• Place the flashcards on the floor in a row.
• Tell students that they are imaginary stones that
they need to step on in order to cross an
imaginary river.
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• Ask for a volunteer to name each flashcard in
order.
• Pretend to be a crocodile as they step alongside
and name the flashcards.
• As each student reaches the other side of the
river, he/she can become a crocodile too.
The Chain Game
• Choose a student to start the game.
• He/She should start the chain game by stating (for
example): In my schoolbag, there are two
rubbers…
• The second student has to repeat the word(s) said
by his/her classmate and add another one. E.g. In
my schoolbag, there are two rubbers, three pens...
• Students are not allowed to repeat words.
• When they can’t remember all the words said
previously or can’t think of a new word, the game
is over.
• Start over so that all students can participate.
Thumbs up!
• Show students one of the flashcards and say: This
is a (pen).
• If it is in fact a (pen), students should put their
thumbs up and if it isn’t a (pen), they should turn
their thumbs down.
True or False Chairs
• Tell students that they are going to play a game
called True and False chairs.
• Before you start playing, revise the vocabulary you
have taught.
• Explain to students what true and false mean.
• Place two chairs in front of the board. Write true
on a sheet of paper and place it over one chair.
Write false on a sheet of paper and place it over
the other.
• Divide the class into two teams.
• Students line up in two rows in front of the chair.
• Show a flashcard and say: This is a (pen).
• If it is in fact a (pen), both students standing in
front of each row should sit on the true chair and
if it isn’t a (pen), they should try to sit on the false
chair.
• The first student to sit on the correct chair, wins a
point for his/her team.
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