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Secondary School English Teacher

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Listening Activities

Scrambled text
· Choose a reading just seen in class
· Cut the reading into sentences.
· Students are provided with a sentence. They stand up and put the sentences in the correct order (as it is in the reading). Teacher reads the text aloud and students make a line according to the sentence order in the text.

Based on the book: Teaching Large Multilevel Classes; Hess, Natalie.

Chinese whispers
· Choose a telephone, word, phrase, sentence or address number.
· You are going to say it to the student who is sitting in front of each row.
· This student has to say it to the partner who is sitting just behind him/her and so on until it gets to the student sitting at the end of the row. She/he has to write it Students can not speak in their mother tongue.
· The winner row is that which writes it accurately.

Circle the number
· Form teams.
· Arrange the furniture of the classroom to avoid accidents.
· Write numbers on the whiteboard (as many as you can).
· Provide with a marker to each team.
· Each team has to choose a member who will run to the board to circle a number.
· Say aloud one of the numbers written on the whiteboard.
· The team which circles the given number first, wins that number.
· Say again a number and repeat the procedure. The team which circles more numbers at the end of the activity, wins.

Add and subtract
· Write a number on the whiteboard, example: 10.
· Tell students they are going to play with mathematics.
· Start like this: 10 add 5.
· They have to listen carefully and write the result.
· keep adding and subtracting numbers.
Example: 10+45-34+60=
· This is a listening activity; prepare as many operations as possible.
· I recommend to first establishing the number of repetitions you will do. So, students will know that they have certain opportunities to listen the numbers and operations and distractions will be avoided.

Funny voices
· Choose a student to stand in front of the class.
· Put a handkerchief on his/her eyes.
· The student wearing the handkerchief on has to ask the question "What's your name?". Another partner has to answer "my name is..." but imitating a funny voice and saying any name.
· The student wearing the handkerchief on has to guess who the person that answered the question is. If he/she guesses, can go to his/her seat. If not, he/she stays there until he/she guesses the real identity of the funny voice.

Picture dictation
· This activity is a dictation of pictures instead of words.
· Tell your students that you are going to say sentences and they, instead of writing, are going to draw the actions you are saying.
· Start with easy phrases such as: "Juan is studying English".
· If you want to raise the level include places, example: "Juan is studying English at the school".
· Also you can try to dictate an image of a place with many people doing things.

What are they doing?
· Form teams.
· Provide your students with magazines or newspapers.
· Describe an action in progress. Example: A man who is watching TV.
· Students search for a picture related to that action in the magazines or newspapers.
· The first team who finds the picture has to shout "Found" and stick it on a sheet. Then they write the sentence besides the picture.
· Say as many actions as possible.
· The team which finds more actions wins.

Fly swatters
· It could be played with five students at a time.
· Provide each student with a fly swatter.
· Put the cards face up on a table or around the clssroom.
· You are going to say a word which describes the image of a flash card. You can also say sentences, questions, phrases, or definitions related to the flash card, it's up to you.
· Students have to hit the flash card related to the word, phrase, sentence, question, etc. that you are mentioning of.
· The first student who hits the card wins it.
· The final winner is that one who has collected more cards at the end of the game.

Competition on clocks
· Students have to stand next to the clocks.
· Ask some other classmate to say a given time aloud.
· Students have to place the clock-hands at the correct time.
· The student who does it faster wins.
· Try to get everybody involved in the competition.

Hide and seek
· Ask a student to leave the classroom.
· Hide the small object in the classroom.
· The student comes in.
· His partners have to guide him to the object. Example: Walk straight, three steps, turn right, etc.
· The goal of the game is to find the object with the directions given by the classmates.
· In fact, it could be a competition on teams.

Definitions game
· Write the names of places of the city on the whiteboard. Example: library, hospital, market, etc.
· Two students pass to the front.
· You have to say a definition," It's the place where you buy medicines".
· The first student who places his hand on the correct word of the whiteboard wins.
· Then, that word has to be erased.