Relay Race Variation
Class size: Any including very large
Level: Adapt to any level including advanced (for beginners use the original Relay Race)
Age: 6 to adults (for 4-5 year olds you need the original Relay Race)
Materials: pictures or words
1. HOW TO PLAY
See the game Relay Race for the overall idea of the game. This is a more advanced variation so that you can see how the games can be adapted.
My games are targeted for children aged 4 to 12 who are beginners to intermediates. However I know that quite a few of you who receive this newsletter actually teach adults, or more advanced pupils.
I got this idea from someone who had received Relay Race from me and they told me how they adapted it for their older, more advanced students. I thought that what they did was an excellent idea and I wanted to share it with you.
I find that the relay race game works really well with older students as well. Or with more advanced classes. I have one class of 16 junior high school boys. They are 14 years old. I have them sit in 4 rows of 4, so I use these rows as teams. I hand a card to the first student in the first row, and he has to say something about the card, or make a question.
Then he hands it to the next student, who makes up a different question or comment. The key here is that he says something different. If he repeats what another student has said his team loses points. The last student brings the card to me at the front of the class after he's finished. I use transport cards, animal cards or sport (popular with boys) and countries. They come up with comments like:
1. I live in Japan. 2. I come from Tokyo, Japan. 3. I like eating Japanese food. 4. I can speak Japanese. The student holding the card is the only one allowed to speak. Other students must listen carefully, so they don't use the same sentence or question. It helps to use a stop watch, and see which team can finish fastest. Speed, however, is not the most important thing. They must use correct English!!
Thank you again to one of my readers for that great adaptation.
I hope you are able to test it out in class soon.
2. Language ideas to use with this game
This game lends itself to any language.
You can either ask your students to stick to a specific sentence type or target structure, or you can give the more advanced students a free hand, as described above
See Relay Race for more ideas at the link above.
3. Materials to use with this game
Use any picture flashcards, or use a word flashcard. The students can make up any sentence using that word. Ask each student to write a word in a given theme on a
piece of paper. Have all the papers passed to the first student in the row and play until all the words have been passed down the end of the line.
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Shelley Vernon
tes