Verbs are essential elements in every sentence. They’re also complex and can be a challenge for learners to master. It’s important to give students many different ways to practice. I always have fun coming up with creative ways for students to practice verb tenses. If you’re working on the past tense in your class, try these three activities. Continue reading
A while back I posted a set of verb cards to use for a variety of different activities. This is a new set that I created that uses actual images instead of clipart. There is a total of 81 different commonly used verbs in English. You can use these cards for an endless number of activities in your class. Keep reading for some examples. Continue reading
After a wonderful vacation in West Africa over the summer, it’s time to get back to work here at TESOL Planner. Let’s start with a fun activity for beginners. As native or fluent speakers of English, we use the verb BE all the time, often without even taking note. Beginners, on the other hand, have difficulty with its use and very irregular forms. I designed this activity as a vocabulary development activity that also gives students practice using the BE verb with adjectives. It can easily be adapted to fit your classroom. The basic idea Continue reading
This is a great two-part activity that gives English learners a chance to practice question and statement forms in the simple past tense. I used it last night in my beginning adult ESL class, and everyone really seemed to enjoy it. I love using talking charts like this because they give learners at the lower levels something to guide their discussion. They also give me something to walk around and check to make sure everyone is getting the grammar. I can point out errors as students are making them. I can also collect them after the activity if I want to give more detailed feedback to everyone. I use charts like this a lot because it makes the learning process more interactive and helps even the shyer students participate and use English. Continue reading
Since the start of language, it has been used to tell stories. It’s a natural part of the human experience to recount events and experiences in our lives. Using past tense forms can be difficult at first for English learners. This is an activity that I’ve used for several semesters to give students a chance to be creative and practice the past tense. It also promotes the use of the simple past and past continuous together.
One mistake I commonly see my students make, especially at the beginning levels, is confusing verb tenses and forms. Have you ever seen this sentence? “She is cook breakfast every day.” Knowing when to use the BE verb and when to use the DO verb to help form verb tenses can be complicated for beginning learners. Continue reading
The simple present can be a challenging to beginning students, especially that pesky third person s. I like activities that get students talking, but I also like activities where students are writing down the grammar. This gives me a way to assess their progress on a given topic. This activity comes great after introducing or reviewing the simple present tense and morning routine vocabulary. Continue reading
As a language teacher, I’m always trying to find ways for my students to practice English in an interactive and interesting way. This activity is a card game which gets students to practice asking questions in the present progressive. Students get dealt verb cards and ask others questions to try and find matching verbs. Continue reading
