Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Eazy_E]

I have a small middle school class (four students most days). We're onto Beeline Plus 5, and I like the book we're using. The students are all motivated and they're at a pretty high level of English. Judging by the nightmarish middle school classes talked about in other threads, I think I'm lucky.

I'm looking for some games and activities that students aged 13-15 might find fun. I use a games-based, child-centred approach for my elementary classes, but most of those games simply don't work pre-teens. Anyone have some games that work well for the older ones?

[Corporal]

Compile some random words beforehand (e.g. Bush, Samsung, rose, wedding ring, Osama, elephant, kimchi.) Divide the class into two teams, pick a person to be in the hotseat, facing the class, not looking at the board. You write the word on the board. The kids have to get the hotseat student to guess the word, without using actions or speaking Korean (obviously). Depending on their level you can use easy stuff like colors or harder stuff like abstract concepts such as truth, love etc. If the students are fairly gregarious this game works really well, they get really excited about playing it, and a lot of English gets spoken. The downside is it rarely works well with shy students (usually the girls) because they will just sit there and not say anything, and the hotseat student will feel stupid because obviously they can't guess when they aren't being given ideas. But since you said your kids are motivated and pretty good speakers, this ought to work fine.

[wylde]

word factory

[tomato]

Middle school students respond to games more easily than you expect.
They enjoy bingo as readily as elementary school students do.

Go fish and old maid have not disseminated into Korea yet, so you will have to teach them how to play those games.

I hope this page on my Website will help you:

http://eslideas.hypermart.net/games.html

[wylde]

[matthews_world]

Try the Chair Game:

Put chairs in a circle, minus 1. One student stands in the middle.

This student makes a statement about the class such as, 'I have parents,' or 'I have never eaten pizza.'

The kids who can say that they have done the same must stand and change chairs.

This game gets pretty crazy and it's good for a warm-up to get em awake.

[matthews_world]

Word Factory works good.

The way I play is to give the students a letter and they have to think of say 10-20 words with that letter. This works with catagories like Clothing and Transportation, etc.

Have them write their responses on the board. The students who have the same word do not get points.

Use the words on the board to play Bingo afterward.

I have my students make their own Bingo card and put the words where they want.

[Eazy_E]

Thanks for the replies. It's good to know that Bingo works well for the older ones as well. It's a dead easy game to prepare and really helps their listening skills. Of course, you need the sweets for motivation

[Len8]

You can also play Jeopardy. Use topics like animals, body parts, fruit things in school or other easy topics. Put those across the top of the board, and the points difficult (400) to easy(100) down the side. Divide the class in two, then start. Get two students to play rock scissors paper to find which team starts. Whoever starts choses a topic, and a degree of hardness between 400 to 100. Your job then is to describe the topic' and the student has to try and figure out what you are describing.

It gets pretty competitive most times, and you have to sometimes decide wether a team really deserves to get their points or not.

If you get through the game, and the class really get into it, you can assign a few students to create their own jeopardy game for when you meet next time.

sometimes works