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    49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities: For Teenagers and Adults
    49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities: For Teenagers and Adults
    49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities: For Teenagers and Adults
    Ebook132 pages1 hour

    49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities: For Teenagers and Adults

    By Jackie Bolen

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    About this ebook

    Even experienced ESL teachers get stuck in a rut. It's time to find some fresh ideas for English conversation classes!

     

    Whether you're a first-time ESL/EFL/TEFL teacher, an experienced but overwhelmed instructor, or an instructor without a textbook, you need more activities for your conversation or speaking classes. If you're tired of wasting time wading through the junk on the Internet, then Jackie is here to help.

     

    During her decade of experience as a CELTA/DELTA certified teacher, author Jackie Bolen has developed countless TEFL conversation games and activities for her students. She's sharing her low-prep/no-prep ideas with ESL teachers throughout the world.

     

    In 49 ESL Conversation Games and Activities, you'll get dozens of ideas to use in your own classroom. The highly-detailed descriptions will show you exactly how to use the activities during your lessons. Jackie's clearly and concisely explained activities will help you add instructional variety and put the focus back on your students.

     

    If you're extremely busy or you're simply out of new ideas, Jackie's book makes it easy to try out new and exciting ESL conversation activities your students will love! Buy the book to get new lesson plans ready to go in minutes! 
     

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJackie Bolen
    Release dateJun 19, 2020
    ISBN9798201488901
    49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities: For Teenagers and Adults

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      Book preview

      49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities - Jackie Bolen

      Copyright@ 2020 by Jackie Bolen

      All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording or other electronic or mechanical means without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher/author at the address below.

      Jackie Bolen: jb.business.online@gmail.com

      Table of Contents

      About the Author, Jackie Bolen..................................................................................................................4

      Who This Book is For...................................................................................................................................6

      Top 10 Tips for Teaching English Conversation.......................................................................................7

      #1: Student-Centered vs. Teacher-Centered .....................................................................................7

      #2: Teach Students How to Ask Questions.........................................................................................8

      #3: The Need to Listen...........................................................................................................................9

      #4: It Doesn't Always need to be Fun................................................................................................10

      #5: Make a Plan....................................................................................................................................10

      #7: Change Partners Frequently.........................................................................................................12

      #8: Give Feedback................................................................................................................................12

      #9: Use the Whiteboard for Key Words and Phrases.......................................................................13

      #10 Change it Up..................................................................................................................................13

      Top 5 Tips for Teaching Low Level Conversation Classes....................................................................15

      #1: Don't Hope for Miracles................................................................................................................15

      #2: Focus on Other Skills First............................................................................................................16

      #3: Focus on Vocabulary.....................................................................................................................17

      #4: Student-Centered Teaching: Is it Possible?................................................................................17

      #5: Build Confidence............................................................................................................................18

      English Conversation Games and Activities for All Levels...................................................................19

      Agony Aunt............................................................................................................................................19

      Chapter Response.................................................................................................................................21

      Conversation Starters...........................................................................................................................22

      Deserted Island.....................................................................................................................................24

      Find Someone Who _____ Bingo..........................................................................................................24

      Just a Minute..........................................................................................................................................27

      Making Videos.......................................................................................................................................28

      Phone Show and Tell............................................................................................................................30

      Role-Plays...............................................................................................................................................31

      Running Dictation.................................................................................................................................33

      Survey Activities....................................................................................................................................35

      Talk Show...............................................................................................................................................37

      The Hot Seat..........................................................................................................................................39

      Toilet Paper Icebreaker........................................................................................................................40

      Vocabulary Apples to Apples...............................................................................................................41

      What Can I do with a _____?.................................................................................................................44

      What Am I?.............................................................................................................................................44

      Where Are They Now?..........................................................................................................................46

      Would You Rather?................................................................................................................................46

      English Conversation Games and Activities for Higher Level Students.............................................48

      2 Truths and a Lie.................................................................................................................................48

      5 Minute Debate....................................................................................................................................49

      20 Questions..........................................................................................................................................50

      Ask Me About ........................................................................................................................................52

      Bucket Lists............................................................................................................................................53

      Character Problems and Solutions......................................................................................................53

      Cocktail Party.........................................................................................................................................54

      Complaint Desk.....................................................................................................................................56

      Cosmo Quiz............................................................................................................................................57

      Do you like to _____?.............................................................................................................................58

      Expert Conversation Activity............................................................................................................59

      Find Something in Common................................................................................................................60

      Group Therapy.......................................................................................................................................62

      Interesting Story and Questions..........................................................................................................63

      Man/Woman on the Street...................................................................................................................64

      Problem and Advice..............................................................................................................................65

      Story Picture Cards Sequencing..........................................................................................................66

      What are you Cooking?........................................................................................................................67

      Who do you Want at your Party?........................................................................................................69

      English Conversation Games and Activities for Lower Level Students...............................................71

      Ball Toss.................................................................................................................................................71

      Can and Should Speaking Activity......................................................................................................73

      Daily Schedule Speaking Activity........................................................................................................74

      Dialogue Substitution...........................................................................................................................76

      Draw a Picture, but Someone Else is Talking....................................................................................77

      Fill in This Form, Please........................................................................................................................78

      Flyer Time..............................................................................................................................................79

      My World................................................................................................................................................80

      Only 1 Question.....................................................................................................................................82

      Pass and Ask..........................................................................................................................................83

      Q&A.........................................................................................................................................................84

      Show and Tell .......................................................................................................................................85

      Did You Like the Book?.............................................................................................................................86

      Conversation Class Lesson Plans.............................................................................................................87

      Agricultural Subsidies...........................................................................................................................88

      Aging to Challenge South Korea’s Economic Transformation.........................................................90

      People Use Technology More, Sleep Less..........................................................................................93

      More Conversation Class Lesson Plans...................................................................................................94

      Renewable Energy................................................................................................................................94

      If I Had a Million Dollars........................................................................................................................94

      Lost in Translation.................................................................................................................................94

      Film English ...........................................................................................................................................94

      ESL Writing.............................................................................................................................................94

      Speaking Class Pronunciation Practice...................................................................................................95

      About the Author, Jackie Bolen

      I taught English in South Korea for a decade to every level and type of student and I've taught everyone from kindergarten kids to adults. Most of my time was centered around teaching at two universities: five years at a science and engineering school out in the rice paddies of Chungcheongnam-Do, and also at a major university in Busan where I taught high level classes for students majoring in English.

      These days I now live in Vancouver, Canada where I teach privately and at some English language academies. In my spare time, you can usually find me outside surfing, biking, hiking or on the hunt for the most delicious kimchi I can find. It's not so easy in Canada!

      Conversation Classes: I Love You!

      Although I've taught all kinds of classes related to English and these days find myself teaching a lot of academic writing, some of my favorite ones are of course those focused on conversation. I particularly like teaching conversation to beginners because it's very rewarding to see students make huge improvements and for their confidence to grow from class to class.

      In case you were wondering what my academic qualifications are, I hold an MA in Psychology. During my time in Korea I've successfully completed both the Cambridge CELTA and DELTA certification programs. With the combination of almost fifteen years teaching ESL/EFL learners of all ages and levels, and the more formal teaching qualifications I've obtained, I have a solid foundation to offer teaching advice. I truly hope that you find this book useful and would love it if you sent me an email with any questions or feedback that you might have.

      Jackie Bolen around the Internet

      ESL Speaking (www.eslspeaking.org)

      Twitter (@bolen_jackie)

      Email: jb.business.online@gmail.com

      If you can't get enough ESL games, activities and other useful stuff for the classroom in this book, you can get even more goodness delivered straight to your inbox every week. I promise to respect your privacy—your name and email address will never be shared with anyone for any reason.

      Who This Book is For

      This book will be helpful for a wide range of people. Perhaps you're an experienced teacher, but are stuck in a rut when it comes to lesson planning and feel like your teenage or adult students are not engaged in your English conversation classes. Or, maybe you're a very busy teacher with an extremely heavy teaching load and don't have a lot of time to plan lessons. Maybe you have closely followed a textbook for all your classes up to this point, but now have a class with no book and are trying to figure out what to do. You might also be an inexperienced teacher and have only been teaching for a few weeks or maybe you've never set foot in an ESL classroom before. This book is for you!

      Perhaps you've been searching the Internet, trying to find some new ideas for ESL conversation games and activities, but are tired of wading through haystacks of useless and poor search returns to find the needle that you can actually use in your class. This book is perfect for you too.

      My aim is that this will be an extremely practical resource to help make conversation classes interesting and fun, as well as make lesson planning quick and easy. I've written the book that I wish I had ten years ago when I first started teaching, and also one with content that I have been using all the years since then. Everything in this book has been tried in real-world classrooms and proven to work for myself as a teacher, and more importantly for improving the speaking skills of my English language learners.

      This book will also be helpful if you find yourself thrown into a situation where you're given a new conversation class at the very last minute and there's nothing provided in the way of materials. This situation is all too common when working at a place like a cram school. The majority of the activities in this book are no-prep or low-prep and require almost nothing in the way of materials.

      I hope this book is a resource that you'll refer back to again and again when planning ESL lessons and that it will make your teaching life easier.

      Top 10 Tips for Teaching English Conversation

      Here are some general tips for teaching English conversation classes that I've learned over the years. I hope that they'll be helpful for you too!

      #1: Student-Centered vs. Teacher-Centered

      When many teachers first start off their time in the classroom, they talk a lot (this is known as a teacher-centered classroom) and way more than they actually should. I did this for years without even realizing it was a problem!

      However, if students are to get better at speaking in English, they need to be speaking in English for most of the class, ideally at least 90% of it (this is known as a student-centered classroom) if they are at intermediate to high levels of proficiency. The best way to make this happen is to put students in pairs or groups of three, set up an activity or give them a set of conversation questions and let them get to it. Monitor for errors and offer assistance if required, but don't interfere. With lower level students, the teacher talking time will need to be increased from 10% to 30% or more but still try to reduce this percentage as much as possible.

      A related note to add about making classes more student-centered is the need for students to have processing time. When teaching new vocabulary or a grammar concept that they're seeing for only the

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