Introduction

The game consists of farm animals, what they look like, what they eat and like to do, and why they are helpful on a farm.

Target group and Time

The game can be played by 5-6 year classes. Students should know most of the animals and how to describe them using colors and what the animals do etc.

Learning objectives

The objective is to activate vocabulary also the ability to transfer knowledge into an action. Also, there is a lot of room for creativity, since the students can try many different ways to act out an action. At the same time concentration is needed, because the participants each have to guess what the other person is describing/acting.

Ideally this game should be played as long as it takes for every students to have a turn.

Instructions to set up the activity

The teacher is introducing the topic of the farm.

Ideally they have some kind of poster to ask the students what farm animals they already know to get an overview on the language level and knowledge of the children.

After that the instructions are explained:

One student has to pick a card (the teacher should have prepared cards with farm animal written on them). Now they can decide whether to describe the animal or to act out the animal.

The other students have to guess what farm animal they are describing or acting out.

Letting it run

Depending on the students needs a worksheet with helpful phrases can be added. Ideally the worksheet should include helpful questions like “What color is my animal?” and a sentence framework like “My animal likes to eat…”. Depending on the language level of the learners colors or different vocabulary could also be included on the worksheet to give them an overview of the needed vocabulary to improve the flow of the game.

Depending on how well the students interact and engage in the game, the teacher could moderate the game more or less – depending on what is needed.

If all students are very familiar with the vocabulary, the game can be altered in the way, that the students play against each other in two teams. Then, not only vocabulary, but also time is a factor of difficulty.