Cards with Activites

Making sentence pairs SNAP

This is a sentence building activity where students in a team of 2,3 or 4 race to make as many sentence pairs as they can.  When there are no more combinations they check how many pairs of cards they found.  1 point for every correct pair.

1. Give 1 set of cards to each team
2. Teams spread the cards out, face up on their table
3. When the teacher shouts START or READY? GO! the students race to collect as many pairs of cards as they can find make a correct sentence.
4. When there are no more combinations, students count how many pairs they managed to collect. 1 point for 1 correct sentence.

Another use for these cards is to play the very well-known SNAP game.

1. After shuffling the cards, divide them equally between the students, face down.
2. Starting from the left of the dealer, put the top card face up on the desk. Continue in the same way around the group of students, clockwise.
3. When the cards make a pair, all students must race to slap all the cards saying “SNAP!” (this means pair)
4. Only when the student says “SNAP”, he or she can take the cards, if the student doesn’t say “SNAP” when slapping the cards, the other students can steal the cards by slapping that students hand (which is on the cards) saying “SNAP”.
5. If the sentence is wrong, then all cards go to the student on the right of the s who slapped on an incorrect pair.

My third use for these cards; (this is a variation on the ‘Whispers’ game)

1. divide the students into teams of up to 8 students
2. give a set of cards to each team
3. spread them face down a desk at the front of the class (one desk per team)
4. tell the students at the back of each team a sentence (from the cards)
5. ss whisper their sentence down the line as quickly and clearly as they can.
6. When the whisper comes to the ss at the front of the line that student must run to the front of the class and try to find the correct sentence combinations.
7. Take note of the teams who finish in places 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc…
8. When all teams have found 2 cards tell them the correct sentence pair, then give points to the first 3 teams who finish correctly.

Card game. My name is ~ and I’m ~

These set of cards were inspiration from the students interest in the very popular, well-known Mario Kart computer game.

I have used them in all grades in elementary school, simply changing the level of English in each grade.

Cards are perfect as you can use them for the entire lesson, but just changing the game.

For these cards, here is my first use;

1. split the class into teams of 8 students each.
2. Have them make a circle
3. give one card to one student in each team
4. Using the key phrases “My name is ~.  I’m ~” ss pass the card around the circle, with every s saying the same thing.
5. When the card has reached the end the students in that team quickly sit down.
6. The fastest team gains points.
7. Play 2 or 3 times changing the card each time.

Game 2:

1. In the same teams students stand in a line
2. spread all cards out on a table set at the front of the class
3. give the 1st student in each  team a balloon, which they have to hold between their knees.
4. You then say the key sentences “my name is ~. I’m ~”
5. Then the students with balloons have to race to get that card from the table at the front.  When a s has found the card, he/she has to race to the back of the line, still holding the balloon.
6. If the balloon falls, that s has to return to where he/she started.
7. If the s makes it to the finishing place, all team members sit down as quick as possible to gain a point.

3rd use:

Interview activity:

1. Students walk around the class
2. ss make pairs
3. ss play Rock, Paper, Scissors to see who starts talking
4. the winner says what is on the card
5. the loser then says what’s on his/her card
6. ss play RPS again.
7. The loser gives the winner his/her card, then comes to collect a new card from the teacher.

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