Paulina's Traditional ESL Easter Egg Hunt

An egg hunt is an activity celebrated around Easter time (different countries celebrate it on different days). In this activity, children look for hidden coloured eggs or, nowadays, chocolate eggs.

This activity is an ESL adaptation, in which children get to practise English, have fun and win a sweet prize!

What do you need?

• a colouring page with Easter eggs (+/- 100 eggs, although it will depend on your game) - ask your students to colour them and cut them out for you.
• (+/- pins - you will need one pin for each "egg") 
• a board with numbers (in my case 1-100)
• a list of secret words
• a list of questions/mini tasks for your students
• a die
• some counters, although these can be improvised
• a prize for the winners.

How much time do you need?

• On average, the game takes between 45-75 minutes. It depends a lot on the number of kids that play (almost unlimited) and their level of competitiveness.

How do you play?

• Prepare the questions and tasks appropriate for your students' level and age (There is a link below to the activities I prepared for my students A1-B2).
• Prepare a list of secret words. I have used words from the FCE word formation exam.
• Write numbers 1-100 on eggs and on the reverse write a secret word. Place the eggs on the walls. Depending on your students, you may want to hide them or make them more difficult to reach - it's up to you!
• When students arrive, divide them into small groups and explain the rules to them (Don't move the eggs, steal the eggs or take them off the wall) and demo how to play the game.

• You may need to add or change your rules according to your workplace policy (No running, no shouting, etc).
• Students roll a die and move around the board. When they land on a number, e.g. 5, they have to go and find the egg number 5. When students find the egg, they need to check the secret word and memorise it (without removing the egg from the wall if possible). They come back to the teacher and tell them the secret word (for B1-B2 levels I actually ask them to spell the word). If the word is correct (check with your secret word list), the teacher asks them a question or gives them the task. When the question has been answered or the task done, students can roll the die and the procedure repeats until students get to the final number (100 in my case).

Here's the link to all the materials

For more teaching ideas go to http://polishyourenglishwithpau.edublogs.org/

Past Tenses Quiz

This quiz can be used for a quick revision of the uses of different past tenses. The chart can be used for sentence analysis or to help students use the correct tense.

In the first case, the students have to analyse a sentence asking a series of "Yes or No" questions. For example, if your sentence is: "I had a dog when I was four years old", you have to answer the following questions:

• Did it happen in the past? - YES
• Do we know when of where it happened exactly? - YES
• Had it happened before another action in the past? - NO
• Was the action completed? - YES

The tense used in the sentence: PAST SIMPLE, we use it to talk about actions completed in a specific moment in the past.

Following the same steps, we can ask students to choose the correct tense. For example, "I ________ (be) to London three times".

• Did it happen in the past? - YES
• Do we know when of where it happened exactly? - NO
• Additional questions: Is it experience you have? - YES.

The tense used in the sentence: PRESENT PERFECT, we use it to talk about actions that happened in the past but we do not know exactly when. Also we use it to talk about experiences.

Past Simple Monster

Have you ever wondered how to teach Past Simple to a group of eight year olds? Maybe you've already faced the challenge and found your way of doing so. So have I. Today, I am going to share with you an idea that came to me while I was preparing my lesson for a lovely group of very talkative and (hiper)active kids.

In my opinion, teaching grammar to young learners always is a little bit about thinking outside the box. The idea of creating a Past Simple Monster came from the fact that whenever I say the word grammar (it should be banned) my student's are at least puzzled and even scared. And so, two weeks ago, without any introduction, I just asked my students to take out their crayons, listen to my clues and draw a monster.

We drew monster's head with mouth that was a vertical DID. Above the monster's mouth we drew a nose that looked like a question mark, and "ed"-looking hair on the monster's head. We wrote "PAST" on the monster's belly and we went on to draw two arms, a straigh=regular one and a curvy=irregular one. The regular arm ended with two hands that resembled letters E and D, with some examples of regular verbs and the irregular arm ended with a hand made of such irregular verbs as was, were, went, ate or could. We also drew monster's feet labeled as LAST and AGO.

I'm sure you're curious what the final effect was. Well, my student's were happy that they could draw and did not have to listen to any boring grammar explanation. What is more, they learnt all the important information about the Past Simple Tense I wanted to teach them. Mission completed succesfully!