Quick esl warm up games

Yes, warm-up games have plenty of benefits and they are a great way to kick off your class. However, if you do not choose the right kind of games then instead of warming your students up they may get you to a wrong start.

We've laid out the best strategies for teaching phonics to your ESL students, as well as some fun games you can incorporate into your lessons! Take a deep dive into the four types of phonics, and the most effective online classroom strategies to teach phonics to ESL students. If you're looking to increase your class bookings with VIPKid, look no further! We have 6 tips to help get you more classes. By continuing to use this site, you accept our use of cookies.

You can change your cookie settings at any time. Toggle Navigation. Teach with VIPKid. Teacher Resources. Ready to start teaching English online? Tips and Tricks. Share This Story. Give a marker or chalk to the students, or a different color to each team. They have minutes to circle the words they think are actual English words.

Quickly draw stairs on the board, going downward. This game is basically Hangman. Each student or each team guesses letters to try to guess a hidden target vocabulary word.

Each time they miss, they move down one step toward the monster. Make a Tic-Tac-Toe board. Write subjects on the game I, you, he, they, the students, etc. Two teams play Tic-Tac-Toe by saying the subject and the correct conjugation i. If they say it correctly, they can mark the board.

Point to random students and listen to what they say. First team with everyone sitting wins, or the last person who sits has to do a forfeit write a sentence using the word. This game assumes that your students can be trusted to be safe.

Hold up a flashcard or put one on the interactive whiteboard. Say the word, and the learners repeat. Then do another. This is the cue for the seat switch. It helps clue the students in if you make it a question. This one is a great activity to get students engaged before class begins. The teacher will say a letter of the alphabet, and the students have to think of things that start with that letter.

Give the students time to copy the categories into their notebooks. The teacher calls out a random letter of the alphabet, for example, C. The teacher can give the intermediate or advanced students a topic, and students in groups have to write down a single question they could ask relating to that topic.

For example, if your topic is social media, students could prepare questions such as:. Students can also make this into a survey by asking ten students in the class and noting down their answers on a piece of paper. A simple game, yet an important skill, is small talk. This is a suitable activity for teens and adult students. The best part about small talk is that it requires almost no preparation for busy teachers like us! The teacher writes some questions or a topic on the board, and students have to stand up and talk to others in the classroom.

This is said to be the mother of all ESL warm-ups. The whole class can get involved in this one and have a lot of fun. Prepare a list of vocabulary words from the previous classes. Bring a chair to the front of the class and split the class into two teams. Make sure they cannot see the whiteboard. Set a time limit say 1 minute and write a vocabulary word on the whiteboard. The team must say things related to the word until the teammate guesses correctly.

Continue until the time runs out. The team that has the most correct answers wins! These warmer activities will set your class on the right foot and set the tone for the class. I hope you enjoyed these fun ESL warm up activities and use them in your next lesson! I'm an Irish ESL teacher and blogger. I started teaching in and have since taught in the UK and Europe.

You will find tons of resources to help you start teaching online, grow your income, and learn and teach languages on this site. This game is best for beginner to intermediate students because it provides ample opportunity to use vocabulary like colors, shapes, numbers, sizes, and locations.

Instead of having prescribed categories, your students can come up with own categories. Categories for younger students could include animals, nouns, emotions, names, foods, weather, or clothing. The class will come up with 6 categories and each student writes the categories down on a piece of paper. Then the teacher chooses a random letter you can find an online random letter generator here. The teacher then sets a timer for 2 minutes and students think of as many words in each category starting with the letter in question in that time.

For example, if the letter was B and one of the categories was animals, a student might write down Bear, Bee, Bird, Beetle, Barracuda, Banana Slug, et cetera. Once the time is up, students read their words out loud. If two students have the same word, both have to cross theirs out you can omit this rule for younger students. Students get points for each unique word they have. Letters like Q and Z can be stumpers for younger students, so you can allow collaboration if someone is struggling to come up with a word for their letter.

Students then guess which letters are in the word.