5. Secret word: Students are given a random topic and a random word that is unrelated to the topic. The students must hide the word in a speech about the topic—they’re trying to make sure the other students can’t guess the secret word. The other students listen carefully to the speech and attempt to guess the secret word.
6. Debates: Give each student a piece of paper with “agree” written on one side and “disagree” on the other side. Read aloud a controversial statement, and have each student hold up their paper showing the agree or disagree side depending on their opinion. Choose one student from each side to explain their position and participate in a short debate.
7. Impromptu speaking: Prepare a list of topics that students will be able to talk about. Split the class into two teams, and have each student choose a number—that’s the order they will go in. Each student will respond to a statement without preparation. They must continue speaking for 45 seconds. As the student is speaking, the other team listens for moments of hesitation, grammatical mistakes, and vocabulary mistakes. If the other team can correctly identify an error, they get a point.
8. Desert island activity: Give each student a piece of paper and tell them to draw an item—any item. Collect the drawings and pass them out again; no student should receive their own drawing.
Next, tell the students that they’ve been stranded on a desert island, and only half of the class can survive and continue to inhabit the island. The only thing each student will
have on the island is the item depicted in the drawing given to them, and their goal is to convince the class that they should survive based on that item.
9. Storytelling activity:Bring four students to the front of the classroom. Three of them should sit in a row, and one should stand behind them and act as a controller. Give the controller a stack of cards with nouns written on them.
The controller will hand a noun to one of the three students, who will start to tell a story. The student continues telling the story until the controller decides to hand another noun to another student, who will then take over the story.
