Lista de juegos

Nivel: medio básico Min: 2 jugadores Vocabulary

Bang Bang

Divide the group into two teams. Explain that they are cowboys and they are involved in a duel.
One student from each team comes to the front. Get them to pretend to draw their pistols. Say
"how do you say..." and a word in their mother tongue. The first child to give the answer and then
"bang bang", pretending to shoot his opponent is the winner. He remains standing and the other
one sits down. I give 1 point for the right answer and 5 extra points if they manage to "kill" 4
opponents in a row.
Editor's Note: Instead of saying the word in the students' mother tongue, it would be possible to
use a picture or to say a definition ("What do you call the large gray animal with a long nose?”)

Nivel: básico Min: 3 jugadores Vocabulary

Describing Appearances & Characteristics of People

Each student is then give one sheet of paper.  One student sits at the front of a room.  He/she
describes a person and the rest of the class draws the person being described.
It is more interesting if the person being described is known by everyone. Once the student has
finished describing that person then he/she reveals who it is and each student shows his/her
drawing. The laughter from this is hilarious as the impressions tend to make the character in
question look funny.
It is a good idea to encourage students to ask the interviewee student questions about who they
are describing.

Nivel: todos Min: 2 jugadores Spelling

Spelling Contest

First, if you have a large class you have to divide it in 2 teams. then the teacher says a word or a
sentence depending on the level for the students to spell.  Students should spell these correctly
with not even one mistake. The team that has more points is the winner.

Nivel: Medium to difficult Min: 3 jugadores Grammar and vocabulary

What's the Meaning?

Level: Medium to Difficult
You, the teacher, may need a dictionary do this activity.
• Choose a word which is long, difficult, and unknown to the students, a good word to begin
with is: warmonger.
• Without using a dictionary, your students write down a definition. (They can work out the
definition in groups of three).  Allow them a few minutes to think and write.
• Collect the definitions and read them aloud.
• When you have finished reading, they will have to vote which of those is the correct one. (It
doesn't matter if none of them is the correct one)
• After they have voted and none of the groups guessed the meaning you read the correct
one aloud.
The idea of this game is to let students be creative and practice writing skills.
Then you can have the students to discuss their writings.

Nivel: All levels Min: 3 jugadores Vocabulary

Catching up on your ABC's

This game is short and simple. Write the alphabet on the board. Throw a bean bag to someone
and say a word begining with the letter A. This person must catch the bean bag, say a word
begining with the letter B and then throw it to another person This third person says a word
begining with the leter C and so on.
Obviously the game is meant to be played fast. If played with higher level students you may not
want to write the alphabet on the board. There are many ways to change the game to make it
adaptable to your level of students.

Nivel: All Min: 3 jugadores Vocabulary and grammar

Crazy Story

This is an activity that will make your students speak in class and be creative.
• Ask students to write a word on a piece of paper and tell them not to show anyone. This
word should be a verb (or whatever you'd like to rewiew).
• The teacher starts telling a story, then stops and chooses a student.
• That student will continue the story and must use his/her word. This student then chooses
the next student to continue the story.
• The last student must end the story.
• After the story is over, the students then try to guess what words each student has written
on his/her paper. The student who guesses the most words wins the game.

Nivel: Medium to difficult Min: 2 jugadores Vocabulary

Words Beginning with a Given Letter

The teacher chooses a letter from the alphabet. Then each student must say a word that begins
with that letter. If a student repeats a word that has already been said, then he/she is out of the
game. The game ends when only one student remains. That student is the winner. In high level
classes students lose if they say a past form of the verb. Example:see-saw. You can increase the
difficulty by adding a timer. Only allow each student 5 seconds to think of a word.

Nivel: all levels Min: 3 players Vocabulary and grammar

Vacation Cards

For this activity you will need a deck of cards, and an imaginative theme that could be crafted into
some sort of story. For example, I choose "send the teacher on a vacation". On the board or
overhead projector make a list like the following. (You could ask your student for imput.)
• A-exciting
• 2-depressing
• 3-expensive
• 4-heroic
• 5-romantic
• 6-fantastic
• 7-sad
• 8-almost fatal
• 9-cheap
• 10-dramatic
• J-happy
• Q-weird
 • K-change one option
Prompt the students a little to get them started; perhaps offer a beginning to the story. They then
must continue making an oral story by drawing one card and continuing the story along those lines.
For example, if they get 4, then the teacher/protagonist must do something heroic or some kind of
heroric event must occur. If the students draw a K (or whatever card you stipulate), then they can
change one option. This seems to help keep the momentum in the game. Continue through all
cards, with the stipulation that the story must be concluded by the end of the deck. Obviously there
is a lot of room for variation here. Your word list and theme could be related to your unit of study.
My students really enjoyed this game; it is most interesting if you personalize it and insert yourself
or a student (assuming he/she wouldn't mind).

Nivel: fácil Min: 2 jugadores Vocabulary

Guess the Letter on Your Back

This game is used to practice the alphabet. Divide students into groups and ask them to stand in
line and give the students in the front of the line a piece of chalk to write on the blackboard. Then
write with your finger a letter on the back of the students at the end of the line. They must do the
same with the student in front of him/her and so on. The students with the chalk try to guess the
letter and write any word that begins with that letter on the board.

Nivel: all levels min 3 jugadores Vocabulary and grammar

Fold-over Stories

This is an old favorite. Give each student a sheet of blank paper. Write the following words on the
board in a vertical line: WHO, WHAT, HOW, WHERE, WHEN, WHY. Explain that everyone will be
writing a sentence story. Write an example on the board, explain, asking for suggestions.
1. Tell them to write someone's name at the top of their paper, i.e., their own, a classmate's,
the teacher's, a famous person that everyone knows; fold the paper over once so no one
can see it, then pass the paper to the person on their right.
2. Write on the received paper what the subject did (suggest funny or outrageous actions),
fold it over and pass it on to the right.
3. Continue to write one line, how they did it (adverbs), fold and pass; where-pass; when-
pass; and last of all, why (because...) and pass it one more time.
4. Have the students unfold their stories, and read them silently. Help anyone who cannot
read what the others wrote, or doesn't understand.
5. Ask one student at a time to read "their" story aloud, or turn the stories in for the teacher to
read. Funny!

Nivel: all levels Min: 3 jugadores Vocabulary and grammar

Find Parts of Speech of Words in a Sentence

• Prepaire cards with parts of speech. Give these to your students.

• Write the sentences on the board.
• Ask your studnets to find parts of speech of words in the sentences.
• You can divide the class into teams to make the games more fun.
Example: Your sentence:
I WENT TO SCHOOL YESTERDAY.
pronoun verb preposition noun noun

Nivel: all levels Min: jugadores Vocabulary

Ball Game
Students stand up in a circle around the teacher. A ball is tossed to a student and the teacher asks
a question, e.g.: "Say a color". The student then responds and throws the ball back to the
teacher.The teacher then throws the ball to another student and asks another question. For higher
levels, you can ask such questions like "Give me the past participle of an irregular verb". This is a
fast game, and it is great for reviewing vocabulary.

Nivel: Easy to medium Min: 4 players Vocabulary

Acting Adverbs

This activity is a great way to introduce the idea of how adverbs affect the way a verb action is
done. Divide the blackboard in two and write as many verbs on one side and as many adverbs on
the other as you can (get the class to come up with them). At this stage you can also teach how
adjectives 'turn into' adverbs by writing down adjectives e.g. angry, happy, and adding the 'ily'.
Then divide the class into two teams and perhaps give them goofy team names (I find they enjoy
giving each other names). Then get one team to choose a verb and adverb combination and the
other team has to act it out, e.g. talk crazily.
My experience with this activity has been with younger learners where some kind of reward is
offered at the end like stamps or being the first team to leave at the end of class. You can think of
your own reward (or penalty) to motivate your class. It can be a lot of fun with both the actors and
the 'directors' enjoying making fools out of themselves or watching others make fools of
themselves.

Nivel: All levels Min: 4 players Grammar

Cut-Up Sentence Kabadi

This is a combination of a basic TEFL game and the Indian(?) game Kabadi(?).
Prepare some cut up sentences from the grammar or vocab area you've been working on and
place them on a table at the front of the class. Arrange the students into teams, standing behind a
line or marker. They have to run to the table and arrange the words into correct sentences,
however, they are not allowed to breathe in. To prevent this the students have to repeat 'kabadi'
over and over. If they stop saying the word they have to return to their teams. The first team to
correctly arrange all their sentences is the winner. This can get a bit wild but it's fun.

Nivel: medio Min: 2 jugadores Intonation

Intonation Fun

Use this activity to underline the importance of intonation when your students, as they often do, talk
like robots. Basically, get them to say the words in quotation marks in the contexts that follow.
'Hello'
to a friend
to a friend you haven't seen for 3 years
to a neighbour that you don't like
to a 6 month old baby
to someone you have just found doing something they shouldn't
to someone on the phone when you're not sure if they are still on the other end

'Goodbye'
to a member of your family as they are going through the boarding gate at the airport
to someone who has been annoying you
to a child starting his very first day at school

'How are you?'

to someone you haven't seen for 20 years
to someone who has recently lost a member of the family
to someone who didn't sleep in their own bed last night

'I never go to pubs'

by a person that totally disapproves of drinking alcohol to someone who often goes to pubs
as a response to someone who has told you they sometimes go to pubs
said before: 'but I quite like discos.'

'What have you done?'

to someone who claims to have fixed your television only that now it's worse than before
to someone who is scolding you for not doing anything when you suspect the same about them.
to someone who has just done something very bad and which has serious consequences

Nivel: medio alto Min:3 jugadores Vocabulary and grammar

Truth or Lie?

It can be used just for speaking practice but it's particularly useful if you're doing present perfect for
past experiences.
Each student has a piece of paper with five questions on it (see below) and takes it in turns to ask
the person on their left one of their questions. The student answering the question must answer
'Yes I have.' regardless of the truth. The student who asked the question can then ask as many
further questions as he likes in order to help him decide whether the truth is being told or not.
Obviously, sometimes they'll be telling the truth. The third student can also join in with questions,
thereby 'ganging up' on student B. Listen how students fabricate stories in an attempt to avoid
questions! When the first student feels he's heard enough he says 'No further questions' and writes
'True' or 'False' next to the question. The game then carries on (student B asks a question to
student C and so on) When all the questions have been asked the papers are passed to the left for
marking i.e. the truth is revealed. The highest score out of five wins.
This game will really open your eyes to people's ability to LIE.
Here are the questions. You can use different ones, obviously.

Have you ever…. 


spoken to a famous person? appeared in a photograph in a newspaper?
danced on a table in a public place? chased a criminal?
been trapped in a lift? done a very dangerous sport?
taken an illegal drug? won a medal or trophy?
sung karaoke? missed a flight?
appeared on television? stayed in a five-star hotel?
left a bar or restaurant without paying? swum naked in the sea? 

written graffiti on a wall?

A typical exchange might be something like:

- Have you ever swum naked in the sea?
- Yes I have.
- Where did you do it?
- Erm. On holiday in Majorca.
- Who were you with?
- Some friends.
- What were their names?
- Erm...etc.

Nivel: easy Min: 4 jugadores Grammar

Whispering Game

Divide the class into two teams. Line up the players. If there's an odd number of players, one can
be the teacher's "helper". The teacher or his helper whispers a message to the first person of both
group A and group B. The game only starts when both players know the message. Then each
player whispers the message to the next player in his group successively until the last player gets
the message. The team which can repeat the message first and correctly receives a point. Start
the game over with the second student of each group becoming the first ones in line.

Nivel: all levels Min 2 jugadores Grammar

Twenty Questions

First one member of the class chooses an object, an occupation, or an action which ever you
decide. Then members of the class try to discover what it is by asking questions which can be
answered by "yes" or "no."
For example, if the subject is "occupations" then the questions might be like these.
• Do you work in the evenings?
• Do you work alone?
• Do you work outside?

Nivel: todos Min : 3 jugadores Vocabulary and grammar

Add a Word

Method: One student begins a sentence by saying only one word. A second student must say a
word which continues the sentence. A third must continue, and so on, until someone says a word
that does not fit syntactically or grammatically. If the sentence comes to a logical end without error,
the next student may say "period" and begin a new sentence with a new word.
The teacher may suggest a topic to get things started. What the students say may also be
recorded and played back, so the class can discuss the error that stopped the sentence.
Example:
Teacher: The topic is 'pets'.
First student: "My . . ."
Second student: ". . . dog"
Third student: ". . . has . . ."
Fourth student: ". . . spots . . ."
Fifth student: ". . . brown . . ."
The sentence would stop here. The teacher would ask the students why, hoping someone explains
that the adjective 'brown' normally comes before and not after the noun 'spots'.

Nivel: todos Min: 2 jugadores Vocabulary and grammar

Verb Review Game

This game can be played in teams or individually, depending on the size end knowledge of the
students.
Step 2: Then the teacher writes something like this on the board : "things we do with our feet"
Step 3: The students then have exactly one minute to write all the verbs related to this topic, such
as: walk, kick, dance, run, jump, etc.
Step 4: After the time is up, the teacher checks the students' lists of vebs. Each verb counts for one
point. Any verbs appearing in more than one list are elliminated.
Then the teacher writes another topic on the board, "things we do with our mouth", for
instance.The student or team with the most points is the winner.
NOTE: This game can be used to review ot only verbs but also adjetives, nouns etc.