Materials: Small cards

Janken Discard Game

Description

The students make pairs. Each pair gets a set of small flashcards, and the teacher picks one card to be the keyword. The cards are shuffled and placed face down. The students take turns in turning over a card and using the vocabulary to practice the target English. The card is then discarded in a separate pile. This continues until the keyword comes up. After saying the target English, the students janken. The winner gets one point for each discarded card (including the keyword card).

The cards are then shuffled and placed face down again, and the students continue. After a few minutes, the round finishes and the student with the most points wins. The teacher then picks a new keyword and the next round starts.

Notes

  • Changing pairs between rounds may help keep the game more interesting for the students and will increase opportunities for peer support.

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Table Flip

Description

Players: 2-4

Card Types: There are five types of cards in this game.

• FOOD (target English card): placed on a player’s plate. Worth 1-3 points.

• ‘FLIP’: Placed on one of the corner spaces of the board. The game ends when all four ‘FLIP’ cards have been placed on the board.

• STEAL 1: A player may steal one food card that’s on the board from another player.

• MOVE 2: All food cards on the board are moved two spaces to the right. Cards may move to another player.

• -1 FOOD: Choose and remove one of your food cards on the board.

1. Players shuffle the deck and place it in the center of the board. All players then play janken to decide who starts.

2. The first player flips over the top card of the deck. If it’s a food card, they repeat the target English and place the card on one of their three plates. If it is a non-food card, the player follows the card’s instructions and the card is then removed from play.

3. The next player takes their turn and the game continues for each player.

4. Once a player has placed down three foods, they get to keep those three cards and the points are added to their total. The cards are removed from their plates.

5. If a player flips over a ‘FLIP’ card, it is placed on one of the corner spaces on the game board.

6. Once the 4th ‘FLIP’ card is placed on the table, the game ends. Any food cards still on the table are lost and not counted towards the point total. Players then count up their total points from the cards they’ve collected. The player with the most points is the winner. Teams can reset and play a second or third game until time is up.

Notes

• The food cards can be changed for any target English your class is currently studying.

• You can omit the non target English cards if you want. The ‘FLIP’ cards need to be in the deck though.

• You can use mini cards you already have on hand, just assign them point values on the blackboard. You will still need to print a set of ‘FLIP’ cards for each group. Alternatively you can select four cards and label them as ‘FLIP’ cards.

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Plus, Minus, Double

Description

In groups or pairs, each get one set of cards. Groups divide cards into Plus cards, Minus cards, and Double cards (For a standard set of 9: 4 Plus, 4 Minus, 1 Double). Repeat with timer. Groups see where they put the last card called, and get (or lose) a point. If the card is their double card, their current points double. 

Notes

  • Feel free to play around with the third card and what its effect is!
  • After a few rounds they can shuffle the cards.

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Roulette Game

Description

The students make groups and get one set of small flashcards. Each group has the same number of ohajiki (or erasers etc.). Students can put their ohajiki on any of the cards. More than one student can put their ohajiki on the same card if they like.

The teacher sets a timer and calls random vocabulary until time runs out. The students repeat. Each group gets one point for each ohajiki they have on the card that was last called.

Notes

In later rounds, the groups start with a certain number of points and lose one point for each ohajiki on the card that is called last.

Roles

Teachers: Demonstration, praise students for good communication. Call the target English until the timer goes off.

Students: Place their ohajiki, repeat the teachers, see how many points they win.

Unlucky Elimination

Description

STS are arranged into groups. Write each groups number on the blackboard and assign a flashcard to each group. On the blackboard next to the group numbers, shuffle and place separate number cards 1~9 face down (if doing 9 groups. Adjust the maximum number to the amount of groups you are playing with. E.g if there are 5 groups, do 1~5). 

ALT/JTE sets a timer and calls the target English. When the timer sounds, the last called flashcard indicates a group. This group can choose a number between 1~9. Once they have chosen the number, reveal the face down cards next to the group numbers on the blackboard. The group that has the number that was chosen is eliminated. Continue until one group remains!

Notes

  • When I played this, to make the game go faster I decreased the number range the students could choose from.
  • I had also 2 of each number so in some rounds, 2 groups were eliminated and in other rounds, no groups were eliminated.
  • If your class has less groups than flashcards you could also assign the JTE and yourself groups (if you want to practice all your vocab).

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Quick Discard Game

Description

The students repeat the target English with the teacher until time runs out. The teacher then shuffles a deck of small flashcards cards and discards one card at a time until the keyword is found. The class gets one point per discarded card. The deck is then reshuffled and continues for the next round.

Discard Game

Description

Students make groups and get a deck of small cards each. They shuffle the cards face down and put them in the middle of their group. The teacher then calls the target English randomly using the large flashcards, and the students repeat. When the timer goes off, the last card that was called becomes the keyword. Each group then discards the top card from their deck. If the card matches the keyword, they get one point. If it doesn’t match, they can discard another, until they find the keyword card. They get one point per card they discard (including the keyword card).

Notes

In later rounds, you could add a new rule that instead of getting one point per additional card they discard, they start with points that equal however many cards they have total, and lose one point per card that is discarded.

Card Drop

Description

Students make groups and divide small vocabulary cards between themselves. They repeat the teacher until the timer goes off. If the last called target English matches one of their cards, they can put it down.

After a certain number of rounds, whoever has the least cards wins one point. If more than one student has the least cards, they each win one point. If any student has no cards left, they win five points.

Notes

If, for example, there are 9 cards in your set, it’s good to have 3 students each with 3 cards in their hand. Any left over students could be put in groups of two, and the remaining 3 cards in their set can be left aside.

Lucky Guess

Description

Students make groups and get a set of small vocabulary cards. They shuffle the deck and place them face down. The students ask the first player the target English question, who answers with a guess as to what the top card of the deck is. They then turn over the card. If it doesn’t match, they discard it face up. If it does match, they win one point for that card and each remaining card in the deck. They then shuffle all the cards and reset the deck.

In later rounds, a ‘joker’ card could be added – if the joker is found before a student guesses correctly, that player could lose a certain number of points.

50/50

Description

Each group gets a set of cards. Each group splits these cards into two sets – ‘yes’ and ‘no’. They can put as many cards as they like into either set.

The students then repeat the target English with the teacher until the timer runs out. The teacher puts the last called card into their own ‘yes’ or ‘no’ set, depending on what their last answer was. Once all the cards have been sorted into one of the sets, the groups check their own cards. They get one point for each card that is in the same set that the teacher chose.

Notes

  • Generally this game works best grammar that has two possible choices, like ‘yes’/’no’ questions, ‘can/can’t, ‘do/don’t’, and so on.
  • Every card doesn’t need to be used in in every round. The teacher could pick, for example, 4 cards that the students need to put into a set then use those. More cards could be added every round.
  • A simple rule change for later rounds could be to have all groups start with as many points as there are cards being used, and they lose a point for each matching card at the end of the round.
  • Another rule escalation could be that the students need to turn their cards face down before putting them in groups, and they can’t reveal what they are until the round is finished.