I whipped this up today as a warm up, since New Horizons 2 Unit 4 kinds speeds through "keep/finish _ing". It's super simple but if you play it silly it's also pretty fun!
The powerpoint is mostly an explanation of how this grammar point relates to giving excuses! This game can be run with or without it.
Pick an object you can hold/pass around. That object is an angry cat that you're trying to get rid of. Have the students stand up, and go up and down the rows of the classroom asking, "Will you watch this cat?" If they can give an excuse using "Sorry, I have to (keep/finish) _ing," they can sit down. If they can't, or repeat another student's excuse, give them the "cat" and have them go around asking until they can pass it off themselves.
Played like this, each student gives one excuse and the game turns out as a quick warmup, but you can also run this game survival-style by skipping the "passing off of the cat" and having students sit down if they mess up/run dry until a winnner is left standing. I'm not sure how long the game would become that way, since not many students get knocked out on the first round, but with the "no repeating" rule, it'd be fun to see what they come up with a few excuses in :) funniest one that came up in class today was "I have to count all of (student in front of him)'s hairs."
This is funny. My JHS 2nd years are a little crazy, I am looking forward to hearing some of their excuses they come up with. I think ill make a copy of the cat and print it out to be passed around. I think you could also set a timer and who ever has the cat at the end of the time limit would be good too. Maybe even have two cats starting on oppsite sides of the room.
This sounds great! I'm going to try to find a similar grammar point in Sunshine!
@Mullberry I looove hearing the kids be silly and creative, I hope you have some fun ones come up! :) The timer idea sounds like it'd create some tension too!
@MinamiCat thank you! :))
Thanks for this great idea.