Games and Activities from #DaDaTips

Turning basic conversation into a killer game. You'll

ask your students a variety of questions or
commands. Teachers choice. Here is an example of a
few I use:

What's an animal that can fly?

Can you name a fruit and food?

What's your favorite color?

Name one item in your school bag.

Choose one letter from the alphabet.

.........

I ask about 5 more questions. In turn, I have the

student ask me the same questions. We build up a
word bank and I type the words out on the screen.
Once we've filled up the screen the game begins!

I will shout out a word and we both race to circle it

first. I'll make it competitive for some students but
very rarely gather points against the young learners.
Let them win, of course, and enjoy!

Need a warm-up, break from the lesson or

cool-down? The color game is easy and effective.
Depending upon the learner, name 3 items of the
same color or more.
I have a simple yet educational way to work on
ABC's, phonics and introduce new vocabulary. This
one is gauged towards young learners. It can be a
warm-up, filler activity or cool-down.

Simply start with the letter "A." Have the student

pronounce the letter and its phonetic value. Add a
word that starts with the letter "A" and continue
through the alphabet. You can have some fun with it.

This particular student has a very short attention

span. So, as you may be able to tell, some of the
words are spelled with exaggerated endings. My
student Daniel likes to say, "Applelelelelelelelele." If
I write it the way he says it, he loses his mind and
laughs till he's in tears. Lot's of fun, very easy and
works like a charm.

Make it your own, have some fun and enjoy!

What can you do if the students are blazing through

their flashcards / courseware and you find yourself
looking for fillers and lesson extensions?

Everything on the courseware has the potential to

talk! Animals, YOYO or even a tree. Draw up a word
bubble and type in a request. Lesson expansion
complete!

Tongue twisters - again, you can find plenty online or

make your own using the students name. Another
thing I like to do with more advanced students is ask
them for different parts of speech beginning with the
same letter e.g. 2 nouns, an adverb, a verb, an
adjective. They use these words to make their own
tongue twister.

I started with 3 letters and we repeated them. Sang

them. Made the sounds for each letter. Then I just
hide the board off camera and remove a letter. Even
with no language (he's 4), he immediately caught on
and could tell me what letter I'd removed. Once he
mastered the 3, I added a 4th. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
I was super impressed that he managed to easily
remember all 7 letters.

“Unscramble the word” can also be played with

magnetic letters like this

Making a story: I have character, setting, objects and

exciting events cards. We choose some and random
and have to invent a story.

Great for learning nouns

Would you rather? - you can find lots of great would

you rather questions online, some are just a little silly
but some open up great discussions.

Headings game. I give them 4 headings - food/drink,

animals, places, names. I then give them a letter.
They have 3 minutes and they have to think of 3
words under each heading beginning with that letter.
They aren't normally able to do that but the following
lesson they have to beat their score.

Longest word game. I choose a letter from my

alphabet flashcards at random. We both have to think
of a word beginning with that letter and whoever
comes up with the longest word wins. I play a few
rounds and beat them sometimes but always let them
win overall.

2 truths and 1 lie. I do this regularly and also for

homework get them to think of 2 truths and 1 lie to
tell me about themselves.

Word train / Word maker

- give a word e.g cat. Student has to think of words

that start with the last letter of the previous word. I
give my student two minutes and see how many
words they can think of.

Give students a simple sentence. Take it in turns to

add a word at a time to see how long you can make it.

I'll send my student a list of verbs and tell them to

pick a verb and make a question out of it. That gets a
different kind of free talk going and its fun.

Sometimes I'll give them a question word as well -

like, "how". then they can use this word and pick a
verb to make a question.

Review shapes. Give students instructions of

something to draw, you draw too and keep it secret.
When you’ve finished both reveal to see how similar
they are. I usually start with a simple clown wearing
a triangle hat.
With the younger ones I sing ‘I see blue’ (it’s by https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYAWf8Y91hA
super simple songs on YouTube but I just sing it)
they have to find something in their room that’s the
colour I’m singing

I play a making words game with my older students. I

put a mix of letters and they make as many words as
they can and try to figure out the big word.

Mad libs

I’ve started doing mad libs with my older ones. I’ll

write down on my white board the list of types of
words with their responses and when we come up
with all the words, I read their completed mad libs
story to them.

21 questions. You or your student picks a category

like toys, or colors, or something related to things the
student has been learning about. Then the other
person gets to ask yes or no questions to figure out
what the animal or color etc.

Example: Category animals

I then pick an animals, like an elephant

Student: Does your animal have fur?

Me: No

Student: Is your animal a mammal

Me: Yes

Student: Is the animal small?

Variation of Scattergories -Pick a letter, then a

category. For example, B and verbs. Have the student
come up with as many verbs as possible that start
with B. You could use any other type of categories
also. This would be good for more advanced, older
students. The teacher could come up with a list as
well, and then compare your list with the student's.

Word boggle.

B. T. S.

A. D. I.

R. E. N

I either use a 3x3 or 4x4 square of letters. Then they

have to find words. The longest word wins. If they
understand English well, then I tell them they can use
a letter more than once.

Bad

Sit

Star

Barn

Stars

Barns

Stand

Dice actions - Get a dice app on your phone. Each

number represents a different actions . Example

1 - Jump , 2 - Run, 3 - Dance etc

flashcard game

I have 3 of the vocab words then I take 1 away and

they have to guess what i've taken away
I Spy

The only text on this page is, "Nat sat..." (picture).

We've all had that moment where we think, "Great...
Now what?!" "Let's just blaze through more slides of,
Nat sat, Nat's cat, Nat sat on a mat..." Hmmmmm.
Maybe not... Take a moment and evaluate the slide.
Take advantage of the picture and expand the
courseware. When I look at this picture, it's game
time! The rules are simple. Ask the student to look at
the picture. Let them know a game is brewing...
Question; "What do you see?" Shoot around some
ideas. Build up a lexical set of vocabulary within the
picture. Ask them to get their mouse ready and let the
games begin.

Ask them to circle what you, "SPY..." Here we go. "I

spy a queen." Student circles queen. Teacher asks
student, "What do you spy?" (If you're trying to make
it grammatically correct, the game can be named, "I
SEE.") The student will say, "I spy (see) a chair."
BRILLIANT! Circle the chair and then it's your turn
again. This game can go on forever. Colors, pictures,
letters etc. These slides may look weak at first glance.
Hell, I've found myself thinking, "they have nothing
to offer!" Then I take a closer look, dig deep, find a
learning opportunity and capitalize.
"Hide the bunny."

I would have her cover her eyes and I'd quickly draw
a little bunny in one of the rooms. Then she'd have to
tell me which room the bunny was in. Sometimes she
would even tell me "under the table" or "on the sofa."
When I tried to move on she wanted "Hide de bunny
'GAIN!"

20 Questions

Hangman

Simon Says

Take turns being simon

Word Chain

you say (i always write) a word and the student has to

say a word that starts with the last letter of the word
you said. So i say hello and the students says an o
word like orange and you work together to see how
many words you can say.

I use my beautiful National Geographic animal cards

and my color cards. The goal of this game is to write
a silly sentence using one of the words: on, in, near,
far, or under (you can add more of these types of
words). I write these words on the right hand side of
the screen.

I close my eyes and pick an animal card and then a

color card. The student then picks one of the words
from the list on the right. Then the student (and I, you
can help as needed) write a silly sentence using these
3 words.

To expand this you could replace the color word

cards with descriptive words that you have written on
flash cards.

So much fun to be had. Adapt as needed!

Flashcards

- Identify the letter / letter sound

- Identify the picture
- Slowly reveal the picture and see if
student can guess what it is before you
have revealed the whole picture

Free Talk / Extend on Material / Ask Questions

Word of the Day

Teach a new word based on student’s level

Sing songs related to material Super Simple Songs on Youtube is amazing!

Show and Tell

I have some play dollars so whenever they earn a star

they get $10 and end up with $50 ..just use a mini
whiteboard with 5 steps..each step gets a funny emoji
and i show them the cash..we discuss what they could
buy..just a little more grown up..it is NOT bribary ;)

Spelling on a whiteboard

I take a high frequency word the student is struggling

with and we spell it then I erase on of the letters and
ask what is missing. Then we spell the whole word
again and we read it again. It's a very quick game
with little to no prep time.

Vocabulary Tic Tac Toe

the white board I made a tic tac toe board and put
our vocab words in it quick. I then had the student
choose X's or O's and they told me which box they
wanted by telling me the word in it. and I would put
his letter on the box

On the whiteboard, I write the word and they have to

draw the image or I draw and they have the write the
word.

For older students, I play a sentence game. Give them

a word and have them make a sentence. To challenge
them, I sometimes give them 2 words.

Using manycam, I have some videos of animal https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lU3t91UUgF0

guessing games. It shows a drawing and you have to
guess the animal before the time runs out. This
captures the students attention and is fun!

On pinterest, you can find wordtoons. You have a https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nysc1SChuhQ

letter or word that turns into a drawing. The younger
students love this!

I have my students to draw some of the things we

learn in class! I find this helps them to remember
what it is.

Tongue twisters http://www.smart-words.org/tongue-twisters.html

Guess the animal sound using an animal sound app

Read a book

Dr. Seuss is a great resource for this!

Eliciting the 5 W's (+how) and choosing a topic and
we each take turns asking each other questions based
on the topic at hand.

So far, it has wo

Let's play the ABC's game!

This is a very simple game that requires little to no

props. It helps if you have alphabet flash cards. I use
Scrabble pieces. If you don't have such props, write
the letter on the screen or personal whiteboard. Let's
get started...

You show the student a letter. My example uses the

letter D (see picture). I ask, "What letter do you see?"
"What sound does this letter make?" I then ask the
student to think of a word that starts with the letter D.

Sunny used "​DaDaABC.com.​" It's not a word and I

usually don't let that fly but it was creative enough, I
gave it a pass. You can decide how picky you want to
be. I don't allow personal names. Anyways, I create a
simple T chart and write her word on the left (see
picture.)

Then it's my turn. I do my best to pick a word that

starts with D which has less letters. I chose "donuts"
because who doesn't love donuts. I put my word on
the right side of the T chart. Now for the million
dollar question. "How many letters are in each word.
DaDaABC.com​ = 10 / donuts = 6.... I have her count
out each letter and write down the correct number
under the word...

Well shoot... Looks like Sunny is the champion. A 10

letter word beats a 6 letter word any day of the week.
She gets a point and the game continues.... "What
letter is this?" B!

Rhythm vocabulary... Let's go!

We learn through patterns and lets be honest... We all

have that one song you'll never forget just because
you've heard it so many times. Let's use this
knowhow to educate some kiddos. Most longman
courseware have a vocabulary page (see picture).
Turn this vocabulary learning experience into a
pattern repetition game.

I will read what I expect the student to repeat. The

first picture shows me saying, teeth teeth teeth teeth
teeth / brush brush / wash wash. You leave marks
under the word so the student can remember the
amount of times they are supposed to say the word.
You can create your own tune, beat or rhythm. This
helps kids learn through repetition. The kids have fun
trying to remember the pattern and I promise you'll
enjoy watching them learn. If they can match the
pattern, guess who's getting a star?!

Most students love a proper competition. However,

no one likes to lose, especially when you're 6 years
old and "Rock Paper Scissors" is life or death.
However; trying to beat another person (their teacher)
can get tensions high and competing against their
coach can be rough. Let's give them an activity where
they compete against themselves and are destined to
improve AND win. I call this one, "The Stop Watch
Challenge."

Once again, teacher preference when to use the

exercise. It can be a possible warm-up, using
previous vocabulary or random words elicited from
conversational question. Or you can wrap up the
lesson with words you've covered throughout the
courseware. The object of the game is to make a list
of words. I do my best to make it rather lengthy. The
student must be able to pronounce each word written
on the screen. It can be scattered or in a nice neat
row. Once you have the vocabulary list, it's time to
play the game.

Show the student your timer. Give them an

exaggerated example. You starting the clock, read the
words very slow and getting a miserable time. This
eliminates the fear of losing and gives them a time to
beat. Explain, if they beat the time, a star is coming
their way. You can up the challenge and ask them to
continue beating their time, earning more stars.