L&S
Listening and Speaking Activities
1. Baseball
Baseball is a game which can be used in a variety of ways. First the classroom is set up as on a baseball diamond so that there are the three bases and home plate. The class is divided into 2 teams (A&B). A "pitcher" from team A asks a question of a "batter" on team B. If the question is answered correctly, the batter goes to first base and the next batter comes to the plate. If he or she also gets a "hit," then everyone on base advances. If not, batter is out. Three outs then team B become the pitchers and A the batters. Each player who crosses the plate scores a run for their team. This game can vary as the questions can be graded by difficulty and so a batter can attempt a single, double, triple or homerun by asking for a more difficult question. Baseball can also be played using spelling words or practicing a particular structure (if necessary, the teacher can "pitch" to both teams).
2. Charades
This game is a fun and useful way to teach students vocabulary while forcing them to think and react quickly in English. It is also enjoyable because the students can get out of their seats and engage in something physical while practicing language skills. The activity is fairly easy to organize. First divide students into two groups then have a volunteer come up in front of the class and act out a word or short phrase. The student will act out the word to his teammates who must try to guess at the word or phrase. If the word/phrase is correctly guessed within a time limit (30 or 45 seconds), then that team scores a point. If no one is able to discover the word, the opposing team may be asked to come to a consensus and try to guess at the answer. If they are correct, they score the point. The teams then switch, with a member of the second team acting out the next word or phrase. A slight variation might be to have the students come up with challenging words/phrases for their opponents to act out (within reason, of course). Sample words/phrases: peanut butter, candle, giraffe, steal, etc. Another variation of this game is the game Pictionary, where one student must attempt to draw a given word on the blackboard and his/her teammates must guess at it. The words may be objects or actions and a point is awarded each time a team guesses the word within the time limit.
3. Broken Telephone
The idea here is to practice both listening and speaking. Students will work on pronunciation and careful listening as they listen to a short sentence which is whispered to them by the teacher. The first student in each row will listen to the sentence given by the teacher then repeat it to the person directly behind them (also in a whisper). This procedure continues until each person in each of the rows has heard the sentence. They must then go up and write what they believe to be the sentence they heard on the board. The students are allowed to ask to have the sentence repeated to them but only by the person seated directly in front of them. One point may be given for the team which writes their sentence on the board the quickest and two points for the sentence closest to the original one. The fun of this game is that the sentences become exceedingly convoluted as they reach the back of the class. For the most interesting results, longer sentences should be used as well as nonsense sentences which include vocabulary the students may not yet know.
Sample sentences: The orange aardvark ate the enormous purple ant.
The pink elephant had too much to drink and fell out the window.
4. Balderdash
The goal of this activity is to work on listening skills (deciding on the validity of various possible definitions of words), speaking skills (developing quick, on-the-spot oral abilities), and improving overall critical thinking. First, four volunteers come and sit side by side at the front of the classroom. The students are then each given a piece of paper with the same word written on it which they keep hidden from the rest of the class. Next, they have 1 minute in which they must think of a definition for that word and then one by one must tell their definition to the class. One of the students is given the correct definition for each of the words (varying who has the correct definition each time). The words chosen for this activity should be words that are currently used in English, albeit infrequently. Once all definitions have been given, the class members vote on who they believe has given the correct definition. This game may also be played in small groups where each student takes a turn reading the definitions of each member of the group from a list of words (with the correct definitions on the back) provided by the teacher. Each must then vote on which is the correct definition. Points are awarded to those who determined the correct definition from among the choices as well as for each time someone chose another’s false definition (the creator of the false definition is awarded a point).
5. Deafman
This is a quick and simple activity which practices students' listening and speaking skills while having students practice transformations. One student is given a sentence, either orally or written down. She/he must repeat the sentence to a neighbour who is asked by a third student, "What did she/he say?" The second student (who was initially told the sentence by the first student) must then transform it. Example: Student 1 (repeating teacher): "It's cold outside!" Student 3 (to student 2): "What did he say?" Student 2: "He said it's cold outside!" This chain may continue throughout the classroom, as each time a different feature or part of the sentence may be transformed.
6. Describe Them!
This is a very useful game in allowing students to practice describing people and objects.
Simultaneously, listening skills are also improved upon as students listen for specific
information. The class is divided into 2 teams (A & B). One student from team A is asked to
think of any student from team B and describe one thing about that person. It may
be about an article of clothing the person is wearing, a physical
characteristic (eg. red hair), or, for students who know each other quite
well, it may involve a character trait (i.e. something about that person's
personality). After each clue, the players on the opposing team must decide who is being described, for which they get points. If they should correctly guess the person being described on the first try, their team gets 5 points, after the second clue, 4 points, and so on. The team which has a player giving a description also gets points - 1 point for each clue given without the opposing team guessing who they were talking about.
7. Jeopardy
This is an enjoyable game which has the students focusing on both their listening and speaking abilities while having fun. They can expand their vocabularies as well as their overall knowledge of several subjects. The activity involves giving the students answers to questions for which they supply the appropriate questions. For example, the teacher will state;
"He was the first Prime Minister of Canada."
Response: "Who was Sir John A. MacDonald." The first student to respond correctly and in the form of a question gets one point. The various topics can range from current events to sports to geography, and so on. The students might also be placed in teams of 4 to vary the game somewhat.
8. Brain Teasers [from Terroux, pp. 123, 210]
These short, puzzling stories are terrific and also very popular with students. They force the students into careful listening and into posing questions. The students listen to a story in which some events seem incoherent or illogical. The students must understand what the basic premise of the story is, then they must ask Yes/No questions in order to clarify precisely what is going on. Sample story: Mr. and Mrs. Peterson take a plane to Switzerland on their holidays. On the third day of the trip, Mr. Peterson reports to the police that his wife has disappeared. The next day the story is reported in a Montreal newspaper. A man telephones the police and tells them Mr. Peterson has murdered his wife. How does he know? The students must then ask questions to try to establish a relationship between the man and the couple. They may ask if they were friends. No. Did they do business together? Yes. Finally someone may ask if the man was a travel agent. Yes. How did he know it was murder? The answer: Peterson bought a return ticket for himself and a one-way ticket for his wife. To find more teasers such as this, the game Mindtrap has numerous similar situations which will baffle students.
9. Q&A
This activity is a game not unlike Baseball and Jeopardy (mentioned above). It has students doing careful listening and also has them practicing the formation of Wh- questions. The class is divided into 2 teams. A volunteer from Team A asks a Wh- question of a student on Team B. If the question is correctly formulated, Team A receives one point. If correctly answered, Team B gets 2 points. The questions can range from the simple and obvious: "Where do you go to school?" (for weaker students) to the complex and more personal: "What is love, in your opinion?" (for more advanced students). Questions like the latter would have to be judged by the teacher who would award points for clear and interesting questions and answers. Students could also be asked to prepare general knowledge questions at home beforehand and ask those questions in class.
10. Talk Shows
The use of television shows has already been discussed in the Listening section of this handbook (All levels) but these are two additional activities useful for students. The first is a listening activity which involves having students practice listening for specific information. The students are given a number of questions which they must answer while listening to a TV talk show. The screen could be blacked out in order to make it more challenging. The show should have a guest whom the students would be interested in learning more about (such as a sports figure or someone from the world of entertainment). They could also be asked to listen without knowing who the person is and must try to discover who is being interviewed simply by listening to the types of questions and responses given.
The second activity is both a listening and speaking (or writing)
activity. The students are asked to listen to part of an interview (either the questions or answers) and are asked to supply the missing information. For example, the teacher will turn down the sound of the TV as a question is being asked by the interviewer then turn it up again as the answer is given. The students are then randomly asked to provide the question. Proceding the other way around could prove interesting as well since the students would be required to come up with the answer to a question when they probably do not know what that answer is. In most cases, they will have to imagine and infer what the person being interviewed might say.
11. Commercials
Once again, the following suggestions deal with watching television. This time, however, they do not involve shows, but rather commercials. The main activity here would be to have students watch a few commercials then ask questions about them. This is reasonably straightforward but has many possibilities depending upon the nature of the questions. These may range from simple comprehension questions to ensure that students have understood the general gist of the message to more complex questions regarding why certain images are chosen to represent a particular product. Other aspects of listening comprehension and language learning in general can be practiced such as vocabulary, comparatives/superlatives, adjectives and adverbs, etc.
When students have watched a number of commercials and have discussed how they are used to sell a product, the students may be asked to create and present their own commercials. This is an excellent speaking activity as it motivates the students to perform their own work in front of the class while the other students listen carefully. The students who are listening to the presenters should also have something to do such as listing the names of the students and the products being presented as well as evaluating those students' performances. The actual commercials could be original or might be a variation on commercials already existing. The students should be encouraged to use props and costumes for better results.
12. Video Cameras
This activity is really not an activity at all, but instead provides a few suggestions as to how to utilize the video camera in the classroom and some ideal situations in which to use it. For instance, the commercials mentioned above could be filmed as could various performances such as role plays. The usefulness of the video camera must be considered since it is a motivational factor (students, though shy of the camera at first, enjoy seeing themselves and their classmates afterwards). Another important role of the video camera is that it permits students to look at themselves as well as their classmates and detect errors and areas which need improving. One final suggestion is to use the camera in order to engage in correspondance with students from another school. These students should also be second language learners (either from Quebec or from another country). This is an interesting and enjoyable alternative to letter writing since most students are curious about what their correspondents look and sound like. It is also less intimidating to correspond with someone using a mutual second language than with a native speaker.
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