My Go-To Games for Teaching English in a Primary School
In this post, I share my favorite classroom games for teaching English to primary school students.
I teach English to first, second, and third grade elementary school students as an auxiliar de conversación. And I find that one of the best ways to get students excited about learning and speaking English is by playing games in the classroom.
Teaching English to first, second, and third graders requires lots of interactive activities to maintain students’ attention. But games make learning more fun for everyone, no matter the age!
While teaching English, I’ve found some classroom games to be particularly useful and fun. Here are my go to English language classroom games.
Hangman
Hangman is a very simple game, and it’s a great way to work on spelling and vocabulary review. Since it is so easy, it’s especially helpful for ESL students who are working on learning the alphabet. But since you can use any word, phrase, or sentence, the game can be made more complex, too.
Ideas for Teaching English:
Hangman is probably the classroom game that I’ve found is most easily adaptable for any subject. You can use any English vocabulary word—or even a phrase or sentence—as the answer. So, you can apply this game to any topic.
Simon Says
Simon Says is another easy game that is great for primary school students. My students in Spain already knew how to play the game (as Simon dice), so that made it even easier to use in the classroom to practice English.
Ideas for Teaching English:
I’ve found Simon Says to be most helpful with teaching English parts of the body, since the game can be used to instruct students to move or touch their own body parts (i.e. move your hands, touch your nose, etc.).
I’ve also used this game to get students to practice recalling school-related vocabulary, like school supplies and things around the classroom. For instance, you can ask students to touch any one of their school supplies, or to point to something in the classroom.
Stand Up If You
How to Play:
Tell the students to stand up if they have something (like a brother, or a pet, etc.) or if they’re wearing something (like glasses, or red clothing, etc.) or if they have a certain characteristic (like brown hair, or blue eyes, etc.) or if they do a certain activity (like play football, swim, etc.) or if they like a certain thing (like chocolate, or going to the beach, etc.).
The students who have/do/like that thing stand.
Ideas for Teaching English:
This game is great for practicing a variety of English vocabulary. Potential topics that you can cover with this game include:
Family members
Pet animals
Clothing
Colors
Physical characteristics
Hobbies
Food
Likes/dislikes
I’m sure a variety of other topics could be practiced with this game, too. Get creative!
Charades
I think charades is a great classroom game because it’s quite dynamic and it gets students moving—which I’ve found is especially important with younger elementary schoolers who get a bit restless after sitting for too long.
How to Play:
Select one student to silently act out the word or phrase. Tell the word or phrase to that student.
Start a timer (maybe for two minutes, depending on the complexity of the word or phrase). Allow the class to guess, in English, the word or phrase being silently acted out by the student.
Once the phrase is guessed correctly, select another student to act out the next word or phrase. (To encourage participation, you might decide to select the student who guessed the last answer.)
To get students excited about playing this game, you can keep track of which students guessed the answers correctly.
Ideas for Teaching English:
Charades can be used to practice a variety of English vocabulary words and topics. Here are a few topics that I think work particularly well with charades in an ESL classroom:
Hobbies
Chores
Professions
Internal body systems (i.e. respiratory system)
Pictionary
Similar to charades, Pictionary offers ample opportunity for learning a range of topics in English.
How to Play:
Select one student to draw a picture of the word or phrase on the board. Tell the word or phrase to that student.
Start a timer (maybe for two minutes, depending on the complexity of the word or phrase). Allow the class to guess, in English, the word or phrase being drawn by the student.
Once the phrase is guessed correctly, select another student to draw the next word or phrase. (To encourage participation, you might decide to select the student who guessed the last answer.)
To get students excited about playing this game, you can keep track of which students guessed the answers correctly.
Ideas for Teaching English:
Pictionary works for a variety of topics, but you’ll want to consider what sorts of things would be fairly easy for your students to draw. If you’re working with first grade primary school students, you might not be able to use many topics other than shapes and emotions. With slightly older students, you might consider other topics, such as:
Foods
Hobbies
Professions
Body parts
School supplies
Emotions and feelings
Categories
Though this game might be a bit difficult with first and second graders, I’ve found it to be a super engaging activity to teach English to third graders. Here’s how you play.
How to Play:
Divide students into teams of four to six people.
Give students a category (i.e. fruits, chores, etc.), and start a timer.
Before the timer ends, each team must write down as many English words as they can think of that belong in that category.
When the timer ends, make each group read aloud the words they came up with. Give them one point for each English word/phrase that correctly fits in that category.
Repeat steps 1-4 with different categories.
To get all students to participate, a different team member must be the one to write down the words each round. That way, all students will get a chance to practice spelling and writing words in English. Also, a different team member must read the words aloud each round. This will allow all students to get a chance to speak English during the game.
Ideas for Teaching English:
Categories can be played with a wide variety of topics to reinforce English vocabulary. Any category will do, but here are some of my favorites:
Fruits/vegetables
Professions
Chores
Carbohydrates/fats/proteins
Cities vs. villages
Healthy/unhealthy food
I’ve found it’s really helpful to have go to classroom games to turn to during my English lessons with primary school students in Spain. Games allow the students to connect with the material in ways that traditional bookwork does not.
I hope you find these games useful for teaching English in a primary school, and I hope they make your lessons more fun for you and your students!
