All You Need is Paper (and a little love) ESL/EFL activities

 I made a cardboard stand for that last minute substitution we might have to do. It has the opening routine with how are you, how old are you, what's the day, how's the weather, and letter of the day. The right side has community helpers kids have to match to their locations of work, two envelopes with memory games that can be changed, and an envelpoe with different words that can be used for a spelling bee or just a spelling activity. Everything was easy and fun to make. Depending on the age of your students, they could help make this. 😉

Remember these? I guess we can use them at any age because my basic adult group used them successfully to practice colors, spelling, and asking and answering questions. After the whole class watched a step-by-step video to learn how to make the fortune-tellers, they colored 4 of the outside squares using different colors. They then wrote 8 different topics on the inside and a question under each topic. In pairs, one student chose a color and the other student had to spell the color as they opened and closed the fortune-teller. Finally, they picked a topic and asked and answered the question on that topic. These are something that can be used in the following classes as a wrap-up and review activity. Adults should also be able to make things and bring out the child that exists in all of us.  

                In August, my first grade class will be studying pets. I found some simple ideas for using corks to paint on Pinterest. Kids use the corks and paint  to stamp circles on a white sheet and complete the animals using a paintbrush or a pen. These animals can be cut out and glued onto bottle caps to produce other activities. You can have the students add or subtract animals. See how many animals there are altogether. You can use them to help students practice making or completing patterns.The animlas can also be used to play Tic-Tac-Toe. When they play, each time they place an animal, they have to say its name.  It's great to see how just one craft activity can be so flexible.

Game today, teacher? How many of you have been asked this question? People, in our case, people who are students, love games. I have to admit there are some rare exceptions but most students will eagerly participate in whatever you want as long as you call it a game. And there's no better way to get your students involved and engaged than for you to ask them to create their own game. In this picture, the students were only 5 and 6 years old so I made the base of the game and they drew the words in the squares. The older they are, the more they can do on their own. The game markers can be objects you already have in the class. We used these little paint bottles so each student could be a different color. In most games I have them make, all they have to do to play is throw a dice and move their markers. In this class, wherever they landed, they had to say this is a flower,  for example. If there was a number next to the square, they also had to say the number. If they said the s...