Games & Engaging Learners

Opening Activities - How to Kickstart FSL Class Each Day

Start a conversation while handing out duotangs: Comment ça va?
Get students using their French - practicing concepts from previous lessons and encouraging vocabulary use
- For example: Create a list of common, simple questions and distribute to class. Have a “hot seat” student who has to answer questions that the other students ask from the list OR teacher starts asking a question of one student, then that student has to answer and ask another student a question and continue on.
Calendar/Season/Weather daily
A video related to topic to start the day
It’s okay to use what might seem juvenile...puppets, etc.
Games!
Remind students why we learn French, how good learning a language is for their brain and connect the lesson to the real world when possible (e.g., authentic text or a cultural component).

Learning French should be fun!

We asked FSL teachers what they did to make learning a language engaging and motivating knowing that oral language development is our first priority.

Here is what they shared:

L'oignon (Inside/Outside Circle); Stand Up, Hand Up, Pair Up: circulating practicing language with different partners
Mettez-vous en ligne (Line Up) - youngest to oldest, how much you like something - least to most; then you can fold the line in half and students now have a partner to work with
Allez au Coin (4 Corners) - Go to this corner if you prefer le soccer, back corner if you prefer le ski de fond ...then find a partner in your corner and tell them why you like that sport...
Use props: buzzers, fly swatters, kush balls, old rotary phones
Crazy sentences, mad libs
Make a French comic book
Play 20 questions, Guess the word on your back
Dessiner et décrire - draw what you had for breakfast or your favourite animal, then turn and describe it to your partner
Entrevue (Interview) - line up two rows of chairs facing each other for whole class. Students sit down and greet the partner facing them. Provide a discussion prompt and set a timer (e.g., 30 sec for each partner). They thank their partner and line one shifts down one chair to the right. Line Two doesn't shift. New partners greet each other and answer next prompt.
Laybrinthe (Maze) - give students a maze and have a partner tell them where to draw the line to reach the end - they do task with eyes closed.
Yeux fermés (Eyes Closed - table of 4) - tell students where to place their pencil on the paper and then close their eyes. They draw part 1 of a simple scene with their eyes closed. After 30 seconds, they open their eyes, laugh at their drawing and pass it to the left. Tell students where to place their pencil on the new drawing in front of them, close their eyes and then they are prompted to add something to the drawing. Repeat until drawing has gone around the whole group and it returns to original student. (e,g., you could draw parts of the body or a farmyard with a barn, chickens, a farmer and a horse)
Performance pieces: role plays, skits, AIM plays, dances, games, songs
Robot Game in Partners: Student A tells Student B (the robot) what to do (good for imperative and action verbs)
Hangman, Riddles, Tongue Twisters
Pictionnaire, Charades, Parlons
Loto (Bingo) - addition, subtraction, shape, colour, any vocab bingo
A to Z chart, personal dictionaries
Où est…? - Student in the class hides an object, another student goes out of the room. Student who comes back in the room must look for the object, classmates must count up in French. Voices get louder as the student gets closer to the object, quieter as the seeker is further from the secret location.
Time Ball- Ask a question and pass the ball, time the kids and ask how much time it took, try to beat previous time, add in two balls, etc.
Simon dit
Ça va? Hand actions, opening to start the class- use timer and try to beat the time from last class
Dix- Students in the class start counting. Student who starts can say 1, 1,2 or 1,2,3. Then the next student has to continue counting from where it was left off, able to say 1, 2 or 3 numbers again. If you say “dix” you are out. Game continues until there is one winner
Qui suis-je? -- Student hides his eyes at the board, someone else sneaks up behind and says “Qui suis-je?” with a disguised voice. The student asked “Est-ce que c’est…..?” The class will respond “oui” or “non”. Three guesses.
7 Up - Give each student a vocab word to whisper; students have to identify the word they heard and student who said it
Jeux de Morpion (Tic Tac Toe) - a grid for conjugating verbs or restating the English phrase in French
Faire de la pêche (Go Fish)
Bataille navale (War)