Sponge+Activities

//Post your favorite sponge activities here. See also Managing Transitions.//

[|Inspiration Lane] - A blog with web-based language activities based on RSS-generated content that changes daily (for EFL & ESL teachers, but easily adaptable to other languages).

__To practice numbers__ -Adaptation: If students have personal white boards, have them write the number and hold it up. Informal and immediate assessment! user:armst156
 * Have a lottery:** //"Le loto"// Each day have students take out a scrap piece of paper and write their name on it. Call out a random number and have them write it down. Immediately collect. Give out small prizes for those students who got it right most often in a month.

Trouve quelqu'un qui... (Find someone who...) A great communicative activity for last hour on Friday. It's helpful to remind the students how to ask questions and about negation. user:armst156

Viva Espana : This is more of a transition piece or my teacher uses it for birthday celebrations. She has all the kids start pounding on the desks or you can have them just pat the desks with a flat hand and then each time she raises a white handkercheif in the air they yell something different in unison. Here is an example ................... Viva Espana ......................Viva el rey ........................ Viva Lisa (it was her birthday) but you can always make them say your name, we want you to "long live" too :) Afterwards the kids seemed to have calmed from being allowed to yell and you can move to the next activity. It may not be as serene afterwards as the farajauqa (sorry about the spelling) but it still works. user:drosteb1 This idea came from Erin Brown-Castillo

Vocabulary Practice Divide the class into equal (or close to equal) teams. Have each team line up at the whiteboard (make sure each team has sufficient writing space). At the top of each teams writing space, have the first player write the same word. (COLEGIO, for example). The students then must continue writing a chain of words, starting the next word with the LAST LETTER of the previous word. So if you start with colegio, you need to write a word that starts with "o" etc. Colegi__//**o**//__ otrografí__//**a**//__ azu__//**l**//__ Each student gets to write ONE word, then they move to the back of the line. They are NOT allowed to talk. Give the students a time limit and see which group has the most words, the most creative words, the most correct spelling etc, and declare a winner. It's great for intermediate level students, and allows students to move while still contributing to a learning environment. user:cartierm

Around the World:(Vocabulary) Pick a student to start. The student then gets up and begins to compete with other students, one by one. You call a vocabulary word, and which ever student gets it correct first advances to the next student. The losing student sits down. The winner is the one who wins the most challenges, or advances the most. user:cartierm

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