Activity

Stick Figure Races and Writing

A jankan based pattern practice for the general infinitive, small talk and follow up writing.

2023 UPDATE: I added a version for Present Perfect 'Have you ever' and 'I have never'. I detailed the small differences at the bottom.

Fairly basic sets of activities.

Introduce or review the target language with the first few slides.

STICK FIGURE RACES
These are done in pairs. You can use the screen to demonstrate. Do rock, scissors paper with your partner. The winner moves forward and asks the other a question based on what's on the screen. Race one has 'Do you want to...this summer?'. Then do Jankan again and again the winner moves and asks a question. Set a time limit of about 2-3 minutes. Afterwards cheer the ones who moved the furthest. Below is a space to write two sample questions and answers. I set a time limit of 2 minutes again and the students write as much as they can manage before moving on. If you are demonstrating on the screen you can click on the two colored circles to make them move.

TALK TIME
After the two races some of my classes do this. Here the ALT and JT demonstrate a short conversation which includes the key question and a follow up question or two then switching. I only do this activity with classes that are accustomed to FREE TALK or SMALL TALK type activities. I think this is a very important part of practice but it is hard for a lot of students and not all teachers are very supportive. If your teaching partner isn't already doing some sort of extended talk activities I'd suggest deleting this part and not suggesting it. Generally after the ALT and JT do a demonstration we set a one minute timer and let the students in pairs talk. It is a good idea to change the pairs from the first activity.

WRITING TIME
I generally have the students do this part solo with the remaining time. They write an answer plus some details to one question and bring it to a teacher and read their answer. The teacher then asks a simple follow up question or two and checks. The student then goes back and works on another question. If they finish two or three depending on the time I usually reward the students stickers. I often do this kind of solo work as some part of a lesson since independent work is not always fun but it part of the learning process. I try to set the sticker rewards so every student should be able to get one. For example if there is 15 minutes available for writing I'll reward stickers for two questions since pretty much all students should be able to do that if they put forth any amount of effort.

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Submitted by UonumaRobert July 13, 2022 Estimated time: All activities together take a full lesson.

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