06/17/04

The following are some other games and activities I've prepared for class.

Weather game - This comes from Patrick Nowlin's lesson plan in the Kumamoto JETs 2003-2004 Lesson Plan book.  What I did was take his idea, find a map of Japan on the internet, colour it in, add place names and the like, and make weather cards.  This lesson is perhaps best for elementary school, but can be adapted for junior high.

I recommend printing out 10 game boards at A3 size (4 students per board), and laminating them.  You can download the game board, playing cards, flashcards, and instructions (English and Japanese), separately by clicking on the links.  I've also prepared some of the weather symbols which I've laminated and put magnets on the back, and then I use them on a big map ( The game board printed out poster-size).  Because the files are Adobe Acrobat, and not picture files, you can blow them up to whatever size and the kanji/hirigana place names will be clear.  To download a zip file containing all the files for this game, click here.

Let's game - This is Simon Taylor's lesson plan contribution to the Kumamoto JETs 2003-2004 Lesson Plan book.  It worked fairly well for me at shogakko, 5th and 6th grade.  Here's the flashcards and cards for the game.  Here are Simon's instructions:

1. Warm up
2. Introduce new words
3. Explain that a verb in it's simplest form, standing alone is an imperative.  (meirei kei)  You can use Japanese or just order students to "Run!", "Sleep!", "Dance!" and they'll catch on.
4. Pair work, demonstrate with the teacher first.  Students walk around the class, find a friend and janken.   The winner gives the loser an order.  The loser MUST do/gesture whatever he is told (within limits).
5. Introduce "please ---", "don't -----", and "please don't ------".  The tone of your voice should be enough to convey the differences in meaning.
6. Simon says game.  Have them do as you say.  Watch them stumble on "please don't ----"
7. Now, introduce "Let's".  Simon recommends that you convey that, "rather than being a generic way to start every single sentence, this word actually has a purpose in suggesting something that you're going to do together."
8. Let's game.  Each student gets 3,4,or 5 cards (depending on how many you make).  Two students meet, janken, winner asks the loser, "Let's play the guitar!"  If the loser has the guitar card then they give it to the winner and say, "OK, let's."  If they do not have the guitar card, then they reply, "No, let's not."  And they don't give the other student a card.  Find new partners.  The winner is the student with the most cards in the end.  Obviously, the question will be based on which cards you think your opponent is holding (or happen to see).

My students really liked this class as most other classes seem to focus on nouns and they can't really communicate.  After this class they could communicate some things to me.  Let's eat lunch, let's play dodgeball, let's go, etc...

Animal Karuta - Good old karuta, great for the younger shogakko classes.

A, B, C Karuta - I say it like, "A, A, A is for apple.  B, B, B is for bear.  etc..."  This way students have to listen more for the letter and less for the object.  Chugakko ichi-nen and shogakko.

Battleships game template - This is a template for my battleships worksheet.  You can change the grammar point on the worksheet easily, great for when you get asked to prepare a game on short notice.