15-30 min.
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Brief Outline: Students race to dictate a passage to their partners.
Materials Needed:
- A section of writing that is either at their level or a tiny bit above.
Detailed Explanation:
- (Pre-lesson planning) Copy the text by hand or by computer/copy machine so that it is A3 or larger. Make two copies of it.
- Split the class into pairs. Get them to janken to deicide who will be the reader and who will be the writer.
- Whilst they are deciding that, tape the text outside the classroom - one near the front door and one near the back door. (If you do it before now, the kids will see it).
4. Explain that there are texts outside, and that the reader will run to the text, try to memorise as much as possible, then run back and tell their partner, who will write it down. They can go as many times as they like until they have copied it down perfectly, grammar and punctuation included. - Shout "GO!" and watch the chaos.
Variations:
- Once they have finished, you might want to use the next part of the text and have the pair swap roles.
Teaching Suggestions:
- The textbooks seem to large chunks of reading on the students, which is completely different from what they are used to reading, which is a couple of sentences at most. This can be really daunting for students, so this game is a good way to introduce the text without putting them off English.
- The text should be just over a paragraph in length.
- I used this game with my second grade JHS students, and we used the "Red Demon and Blue Demon" story from Total English 2. It was perfect because the next week the students were to memorise the whole story so this was a great way to introduce that.
Tips/Cautions:
- Very noisy game! Warn them to be careful of tripping over tables and so on, and ask them not to push each other or fight to get out the door faster...because I have actually seen this done.
Comments:
- My 2nd graders enjoyed this a lot.
- (Sept 28, 2010) D said: Tried this today and the kids absolutely loved it! One thing though.... just seeing me posting the papers out in the hallway seemed to have upset the chemistry teacher in the room across, and he was asking my students what on earth they were doing outside of the classroom. We ended up having to move the entire activity inside. Granted that my school is relatively big and quite strict, but yeah something for everyone to think about before planning this activity =D
- (May 7, 2010) Mark said: One of the most fun games ever.