Helping your ESL students become confident and familiar with a language that they might only hear at home can be a challenge. Much of the language that they need will only really develop through interactions with their peers, but they need to have that confidence first. This can be easily developed by using some of the games, activities, and strategies that we have carefully chosen for you below. Take a look, and see what works best for your ESL students.
1. Mix language with music
Songs and chants help students master language. Adding in movement and hands-on learning experiences, such as physical response strategies, can help your students to develop their confidence and resilience to language learning much more easily. Songs can help kids learn body parts, days, months, seasons, and routines quickly and easily.
Learn more: Multi Briefs: Exclusive
2. Guessing Games
Songs and chants help students master language. Adding in movement and hands-on learning experiences, such as physical response strategies, can help your students to develop their confidence and resilience to language learning much more easily. Songs can help kids learn body parts, days, months, seasons, and routines quickly and easily.
Learn more: Hot Chocolate Teachables
3. Musical Chairs
Musical chairs is a great total physical response game to get students having fun whilst learning new vocabulary. Each chair has a vocab word stuck on it, and the last child to sit has to read out the word. Need more challenges? Ask them to translate the word or to use it in a sentence.
Learn more: Bilingual Kidspot
4. Play What’s The Time, Mr. Wolf?
Active games are great for engaging learners. With this game, learners are developing their ability to read and express their time, which is a crucial skill to have in any language. This game is inclusive and easily adaptable as the times used can easily be matched to the needs of individual learners.
Learn more: International TEFL and TESOL Training
5. Puzzle Match game
This game is specific to sea animals, but you could make or find your own matching game to cover any topic that you are teaching. It’s also a great way to help your kids understand and use more functional language that they will need to use during the school day.
Learn more: EZPZ Learn
6. Use pop-its
Your ESL kids may be getting used to the Roman alphabet, and that can be tricky if they are used to a different style of writing. Pop-its are a great, fun way of teaching and reinforcing the sounds and shapes of the Roman alphabet. Additionally, they are both tactile and soothing.
Learn more: We Are Teachers
7. Make sentence posters
Sentence posters can be great for helping ESL students to learn how to use words in different ways. Pre-made posters are available, but if the students are able to create the posters themselves they will develop confidence in their abilities to use the words orally in different contexts, and it can be made into a game.
Learn more: Sea of Knowledge
8. About Me board game
This is a great “getting to know you” game to play with your ESL students. If there is someone able to speak with the student in their native language then it can be played straight away, or as an ice-breaker to help the students get to know each other.
Learn more: International TEFL and TESOL Training
9. Letter Sound Match
This is a great activity for students who use different alphabets in their home language. It allows students to become familiar with sounds and their corresponding letters, and for a challenge, they could be asked to think of other words starting with the same sound. This activity is easily adapted to meet individual needs.
Learn more: No Time for Flashcards
10. Talk About Food
This is a great activity to encourage ESL students to talk about the different foods that people eat around the world. It is adaptable and can be simplified to use with younger elementary students or those who are very new to learning English. It can help identify what teaching would benefit the student next.
Learn more: International TEFL and TESOL Training
11. Describe It
This is a great game to encourage students to use their descriptive language to describe an object, and the others have to guess what it is. The object can be anything, but for learners who are new to the language using a familiar object would be better than using an obscure object.
Learn more: Teachers Pay Teachers
12. Online word searches
When tailored to the vocabulary being learned, an online word search can be a great way of reinforcing new words and new spellings. They allow students to apply their new knowledge and understanding either independently or collaboratively, and as a stretch activity, they could be asked to use the words in oral sentences.
Learn more: EZ PZ Learn
13. Play “Can you…?”
This is another really easy game to adapt to meet the needs of your students. You can ask specific questions, such as “Can you spin around?” and if the student replies “I can” then they spin around. This physical response helps to embed the vocabulary and can be simplified or made more difficult as necessary.
Learn more: International TEFL and TESOL Training
14. Find Someone Who…
“Find Someone Who” is a great game for encouraging your ESL students to interact with other students and with each other. It’s particularly good as an icebreaker session, and it can be used to identify which speakers are growing in confidence and which may need an extra boost. Pair a shy speaker up with a more confident speaker so they feel included.
Learn more: Etsy
15. Tenses Game
Getting used to speaking in the correct tense in the English language can be a challenge. This guided speaking activity concentrates on the present simple and the present continuous tenses and helps your students gain confidence when choosing and using the correct tense. For support, ESL students could be paired with a native speaker until they are more confident.
Learn more: iSLCOLLECTIVE
16. Animals Board Game
This game is fabulous for encouraging your students to work collaboratively to name different types of animals. It could be supported by providing an image bank of animals with their English names written on it, and students can have the opportunity to answer either in single words, in phrases, or in sentences.
Learn more: iSLCOLLECTIVE
17. The Telephone Game
This game is really quick and easy and doesn’t require any set-up at all. Students line up, and they have to pass the sentence along to the end of the line by whispering it to the person next to them. This activity requires a sentence that is easily understood by all the students.
Learn more: ESL Speaking
18. Parts of the Body
Digital games can be really useful to help ESL learners develop their understanding of vocabulary and sentence structure. Knowing about parts of the body is essential in helping students to describe themselves and others, as well as to ask and answer questions about sickness and health. This site also links to further activities.
Learn more: Games 4 ESL
19. Play Memory
Memory is a great game to play with ESL learners because it can be very easily adapted to meet their needs. At the most basic level, they just have to match the cards. Then they say the word that the picture represents, then they use that word in a sentence.
Learn more: A World of Language Learners
20. Headbandz
Again, games are the best way of helping learners get to grips with the English language. When playing Headbandz, you can use the cards which come with the game or use topic-specific cards to support in-class learning. Picture cards can be used to support less confident students, and more confident students can use the words in a sentence.
Learn more: A World of Language Learners
21. Daily Routines
Daily routines are a crucial part of school life, and it’s important that students understand and can discuss them easily. Again, online games can be a useful tool to support students develop their understanding of the vocabulary around daily routines, but it’s even more useful if the routines are specific to your setting.
Learn more: Games 4 ESL
22. Hot Potato
Hot Potato is traditionally a great party game, but it can also be used as a warm-up activity or as a filler when it comes to practicing new vocabulary. Students pass the potato around. As they catch they are shown a flashcard, if they identify the word correctly they continue. If not, they sit out.
Learn more: ESL Speaking
23. Go (icebreaker) Fish!
This is a really fun game for students to use to get to know each other, either in their home language or in English. Students can answer using single words or phrases, or in sentences, if they feel more confident. Students can also answer using a mix of their home language and English if they prefer.
Learn more: Anton
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