Turn Around

Introduction:
A fun game that will get your students active.

What is learnt?
Irregular Verbs

How the game is played:

1. Face the students and ask them to stand up. Tell them to mirror what you do with body and voice:

   • you now roar like a lion, clawing the air
   • you blow a kiss with a gracious hand movement
   • you wave goodbye.
   
   
2. Ask them to pair off and stand back to back. Tell them you will count to three and on three they are to spin round and do one of the three gestures. They must not agree beforehand on which one. Their aim is to spontaneously choose the same one as their partner does.
3. Count to three - they spin round. Do this three or four times.


4. Ask the students to change partners. Write on the board:

go / infinitive
went / past
gone / past participle


Wipe the first column from the board and ask them to agree with their partners on a mime to capture the idea of the infinitive, a mime to represent the past and one they like for the past participle. Make clear that the mimes are to represent the grammar ideas, not the meaning of this particular verb. You may have to use mother tongue with elementary students to get the idea across clearly. Give the class enough time to create good mimes.



5. Tell them they are going to play the spinning round game again but this
   time to practise the parts of some irregular verbs.
   You write up another verb on the board and explain the meaning, or give the translation if necessary. They get into the back-to-back position and you give them 'one, two, tbreeV They spin round and do the mime as well as say the correct part of the verb, hoping to have chosen the same word and mime as their partner.


6. Run through a dozen hard irregular verbs this way.

Acknowledgments: Thanks to Graham.J.B. for submitting this game to us.

02.01.2007. 12:14