Do you want to make teaching fun and liven up your English classes, but you can’t because you are stuck with following a syllabus? You might be following a set curriculum and only have 1 hour a week. There’s no time for any games! You are not alone, many teachers follow a syllabus, which is a huge help to a teacher. Imagine if you had to think up every lesson from scratch? The textbook creators have spent months working on these books, ensuring progression is gradual, and all the basics are covered. So having a textbook is a time-saver for you.

Make teaching fun with games!

My ESL games are perfect for use alongside any syllabus or textbook. First, look at the new vocabulary and grammar in the upcoming unit in your book. Notice also any revision. Those words and structures will be what you work on using games.

Introduce new English with listening games

Here’s how I proceed in a typical lesson. I usually start by teaching something new when the children are fresh. First, I use some listening games to introduce new vocabulary or new grammar. I never overwhelm pupils by introducing new vocab and grammar together; it’s one or the other. Students hear the new language repeatedly during the listening game(s). During this time, they memorize the meaning and hear the pronunciation.

Progress to speaking

Then move on to speaking games where students have a chance to try these words out for themselves. These would be easy speaking drills that are disguised as games. Through repetition, students remember.

Disguise language drills as games.

Consolidate with reading and writing games

So, now you open up your textbook and read the unit. You can also play reading games at this point, where kids race to find target words or grammar in the text from your book.

And finally, complete any writing tasks for consolidation. There are writing games which are more effective than gap-fills and many textbook writing tasks.

Great results and motivated kids

The result of making teaching fun is that pupils will learn the stuff in the unit. Usually, when kids sit there and follow a textbook for an hour, it goes in one ear and out the other. I’ve met so many children at the start of secondary school in France who can just about say, “My name is Sylvie, I live in Saint Denis, I ‘ave a dog,” and that’s about it! Then you find out they have been learning English several hours a week for SEVEN years, and you wonder how they can know so little. It’s frankly an achievement to teach in a way that the children are literally prevented from learning anything!!

So please give my games a go. Please ask your question in the comments below or email me for help anytime. If you have a big class, then be careful to keep noise and excitement to acceptable levels. My books have calm games as well as handy classroom management tips. Giving fun lessons is harder work for the teacher in that it requires more energy, BUT the results are so much better and the pupils so much more motivated that the pleasure gained more than outweighs the extra effort required.

Fun teaching resources to liven up any syllabus

You can check out my games books here in download, and here in paperback.

And email me for help anytime!

Kind regards

Shelley Ann Vernon

Great resources to make teaching fun!