English Games for Students of All Ages

Marilyn L. Brown

Nope! We're not talking about cricket here. English games make teaching and learning the important skills of grammar and composition much more fun and exciting. Games can fit in to a small block of five minutes or be used as a lesson to review skills before a test or as a preview to more advanced material.

English games can be adapted to include multiple age or skill levels. A less advanced child may be given more time or easier questions.

Here are some great games:

NOUN NAME ENGLISH GAME

Supplies: Paper and pencil and timer

Directions:
1.Divide students into small groups of 2-4.
2.Review nouns(names of people places and things).
3.Give a certain time (3-7 minutes) for teams to list as many nouns as they can think of that fit a certain criteria(start with a specific letter, are found on page ? of a science PACE, are something that can run, eat, …)

SENSE SENSE

Supplies: None

Directions:
1.Have each student think of a food or other item that can be described using several senses.
2.Have one student comes to the front of the group and tell how the food looks, feels, smells, sounds and tastes with out using the name of the thing.
3.Have students try to guess the item.

CAPTURE

Supplies: Dictionaries

Directions:
1.Divide class into pairs.
2.Give each pair a dictionary.
3.Announce an animal.
4.Each pair races to find the guide words that capture the animal.
5.The first pair may announce a new animal.

WEARY WORDS

Supplies: Dictionaries, paper and pencil

Directions:
1.Divide class into pairs.
2.Give each pair a dictionary.
3.Announce an overused word. ex. ran, got, said, happy, good, bad, nice, O.K.
4.Each pair races to find the most replacements for the word.

HEAD LINE

Supplies: Paper and pencil

Directions:
1.Write a headline on the board.
2.Have the children write a newspaper story.
3.Read the stories.

WORD PYRAMID

Skill: Spelling

Supplies: Paper and pencil

Directions:
1.Divide students into small groups of 2-4.
2.Write a vowel or 2 letter word.
3.Have children make a word pyramid.

a
an
pan
plan
plant
planet
planets

The tallest pyramid wins and chooses the next word or letter.

SENTENCE SURGERY

Supplies: Prepared sentences

Directions:
1.Divide class into groups of 2-4.
2.Give each group a sentence to perform surgery.
3.Have them list each noun, verb, pronoun, adjective…

ADJECTIVE ADD

Skill: Using adjectives

Supplies: Paper and pencil

Directions:
1.Write a sentence containing 2 or more nouns.
2.Have the students copy the sentence neatly using an adjective before the noun.
3. Each child that used an adjective that no one else used wins a point.

SENTENCE ENGLISH GAME

Supplies: Chalk and chalk board

Directions:
1.Write a word on the chalk board.
2.Have students come up one at a time to add a word or punctuation.
3.When a sentence is complete the next student may begin a new sentence.

ALPHABET WORDS

Supplies: Timer, paper and pencil

Directions:
1.Divide class into small groups.
2.Announce a category ex. food, books, baseball…
3.Have the groups write one word for each letter of the alphabet ex. Fruit
a= apple
b= banana
c=cantaloupe
d=

WORD TOSS

Supplies: Beanbag

Directions:
1.Have students sit in a circle. Give the beanbag to a student.
2.He says a word, spell it. “Dog-spell it”
3.He tosses the beanbag. The student that catches it must spell the word. If correct, he announces the next word; if incorrect, he returns the beanbag and the first student must spell the word.

20 QUESTIONS

Supplies: Paper, pencil

Directions:
1.One player chooses a noun and writes it down.
2.Other players ask questions that can be answered with “yes” or ”no” to try to figure out the noun.
3.The player that guesses correctly chooses the next noun. An incorrect guess means one is out for the rest of that round.
4.If more than 20 questions must be used the player that wrote down the noun wins and must tell that noun and choose another.

NAME ACRONYMS

Skill: Creative writing

Supplies: Paper and pencil

Directions:
1.Have students write their name down the side of the paper vertically.
2.Have them write a word for each letter that describes them.

J joyful
A attentive
M merciful
E eager
S shares

BREAK DOWN

Supplies: Chalk and chalk board, paper and pencil

Directions:
1. Write a long word on the board.
2.Children are to write as many smaller words as they can from any arrangement of letters contained with in the word. If a letter is used one time with in the word it may only be used once. If it is repeated on the board then it may be repeated on paper.

SCRAMBLED STORY

Supplies: Stop watch

Directions:
1.Begin to tell a story. To make the story even goofier, privately assign similar but different topics. (old dog, puppy, stuffed dog, and wolf)
2.Stop at 30 seconds—mid sentence or not.
3.The student seated next to you will pick up the story and tell the next 30 seconds.
4. Each 30 seconds a different student may tell a part of the story.

ADVERB ADD

Skill: Using adverbs

Supplies: Chalk and chalk board

Directions:
1.Remind students what adverbs are—words that tell how when or where.
2.Give students a short sentence. The cat walks.
3.The first student will repeat the sentence while adding an adverb. The cat walks fast.
4.The next child repeats this and adds another adverb. Sneakily the cat walks fast.
5.Continue with this as long as possible, and then begin a new sentence.

VERBS ENGLISH GAME

Supplies: Pencil and paper

Directions:
1.Review verbs.
2.Give the students a noun. Tree
3.Divide the students into small teams of 3 – 5 students.
4.Each team will list as many verbs as logically go with that noun.
5.Encourage creativity.
6.Each unique verb earns a point. “Falls shakes and sways” would earn points but “runs” would not.

WORD TRAIN ENGLISH GAME

Supplies: None

Directions:
1.Seat children in a circle.
2.Say then spell a word. CAT C-A-T
3.The student seated next must say then spell a word that begins with the last letter used. TRAIN T-R-A-I-N
4.Continue around the circle. NET N-E-T, THE T-H-E
5.No word may be repeated.

WEARY WORDS

Supplies: Paper or white board, pencil, paper, dictionary

Directions:
1.Remind students what overused words are—words that are used often but are not clear.
2.Write a sentence with several over used words on the board. The boy said, “Hi.”
3.The teams race to find the most replacement words. Youth, youngster, child, yelled, whispered, howdy, hey, greetings.
4.A point is scored for each suitable replacement word.

HANGMAN ENGLISH GAME

Supplies: Chalk and chalk board

Directions:
1.Begin by thinking of a word.
2.Write blanks, one for each letter on the board.
3.Divide class into two teams.
4.Draw a gallows on the boards.
5.Each team has a turn to guess a letter. If it is correct then it is put in the blank. If it is incorrect then a body part is added to the gallows.
6.The first team guessing the word or not totally drawn wins.

So, you see, coming up with exciting English games isn't as difficult as it sounds. Just follow the directions and you're on your way. We hope these English games make your school day more exciting and help you to be the best teacher possible.

Want something other than English games. Click here for more!

If you're finished with English games,
click here to start over at the homepage.