Interactive Beginner ESL Grammar Exercises

Grammar exercises are an integral part of an ESL lesson and needn't be dry and uninteresting. By focusing on making all grammar exercises as student-focused and as interactive as possible they can be interesting, enjoyable and, most importantly, effective. The teacher should keep language as simple as possible when explaining an exercise and make use of stronger students to help demonstrate. In addition, all grammar exercises should be appropriate to the level of the students.
  1. Present Continuous Charades

    • Divide the class into groups of three or four and issue each group slips of paper, face down, on which you have written prompts. You might write, for example, "walking upstairs," "singing a song," "drinking hot coffee," or "making an omelet." Each person in the group takes it in turns to pick up a slip of paper and act out the prompt. The other members of the group attempt to correctly guess what the first student is miming and produce a grammatically correct structure in the present continuous, for example, "You are walking upstairs." Students can keep score if they wish. Circulate as the students work and give help where necessary.

    Verb Tennis

    • Divide the class into two teams and give each team some time to think of approximately ten verbs. One team starts, or serves, by saying a verb, the other team must return this service by saying the past tense of this verb and the initial team must now say the past participle of the same verb. Then prompt the other team to start, or serve. Keep score as in tennis so if one team gets a past tense or past participle incorrect then the score becomes 15-love to the other team, then 30-love and so on.

    Tic-tac-toe

    • On the whiteboard or blackboard draw a tic-tac-toe grid. In the spaces where you would normally put a cross or a zero, write language you wish to practice. You might write, for example, "going to," "sleeps," "behind, " "makes," "does," and "can." Divide the class into two teams. Ask one team to pick any word from the tic-tac-toe grid and to tell you a sentence of five words or more containing that word. For example, "He is going to go to the bank later." Set a time limit of approximately ten seconds. If the team manages to form a grammatically correct sentence, then rub out the word and replace it with a cross or a zero. If the sentence is not grammatically correct, leave the word in the grid. It is now the other team's turn to pick a word and attempt to form a grammatically correct sentence. Continue until one team has a line of three zeros or crosses.

    The Never Ending Sentence

    • Divide the class into groups of three or four and write the words "I like" on the blackboard or whiteboard. Ask one group to add one word to this sentence that will continue it in a grammatically correct way, for example, "to," and write this on the board. Ask the next group to add another word to this sentence that will again continue it in a grammatically correct way, for example, "go." Continue in this fashion with each group adding a word to the sentence. When one group cannot think of a word in approximately ten seconds or adds a grammatically incorrect word then they are out and the exercise continues without them. Continue until only one group remains.

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