The best way to pique students’ interests in grammar lessons is to engage them in fun grammar games and activities that allow them to connect emotions with new knowledge or concept. This connection with emotions creates memories that do not easily go away and are easy to retrieve when needed.
Here are a few grammar games and activities that we can use to excite the students before, or during, grammar lessons. Some of them offer cool introductions of new concepts while others offer a teacher some methods to make practice more memorable.
1. The Verb Family Tree
Focus: Verb
This tree will teach the students different forms of verbs as children of the root verb.
You can do this activity on the whiteboard or you can opt for a worksheet version. Either way, you first have to start on the board so the students get the idea.
- Draw a family tree with four branches
- The root or trunk is the root word or the main verb
- Name every branch a particular form. For example, the branch of the eldest brother could be the third-person singular form of the verb. Another branch is plural or past form, and so on.
- Demonstrate with one word and call excited students to name siblings of verbs of your choice.
You may also let them play this game in pairs.
2. Magnet of Praise
Focus: Adjective, Adverb
This is one of the many grammar games and activities on this list that allows students to revise adjectives. You can also adapt this game to let them remember adverbs.
It is easy to conduct, and you can choose to give out worksheets or do play it on the board.
- Draw a magnet that is attracting nails.
- Tell the students that the magnet is a noun (or verb) and wants nails that define its qualities.
- Write any noun (verb) on the magnet and call the students to qualify or modify it.
Be ready to get surprised by the adjectives students create on the spot.
3. Time Box
Focus: Verb Tenses
This activity will help your students identify the time to which a sentence belongs after studying the verbs and auxiliary verbs.
- Divide the students into teams.
- Take six (or more depending on the number of teams you make) boxes and label them past present and future.
- Then write different sentences (thirty to fifty will do for a detailed game) on pieces of cardboard and make two piles.
- Teams will brainstorm and assign each sentence to the relevant box.
In addition to encouraging the students to practice grammar, this activity will also help them with communication skills as they will discuss before putting the sentences in the right boxes.
4. Sentence Grid
Focus: Parts of Speech
This activity focuses on the basics of language. It allows the students to distinguish between nouns, verbs, adjectives, and other parts of speech.
It is another minimalistic activity that only requires the board and marker. You have to start by drawing eight boxes on the board. Label them accordingly. (You can enhance the layout by using different colors for different parts of speech.)
- Next, write random words from all parts of speech at a side column of the board. Or you can choose to dictate the words.
- Give an example by assigning some words of students’ choice to the relevant grid.
- Ask each one of the students to write a dictated word in the appropriate grid box depending on the part of speech it represents
5. Verb adverb charades
Before the Lesson
Create two sets of cards; each set should be on a different colored paper. Make at least one card per student in each color. Index cards or paper cut to 3 x 5 inches works well.
- Create a set of verb cards on cards of one color, at least one verb card per student. (See a sample verb list at the bottom of this section.)
- Create a set of adverb cards on cards of another color. (See a sample adverb list at the bottom of this section.)
- Stack the verb cards upside down in one pile; stack the adverb cards in another pile.
The Lesson
This game can be played as a whole class or with the class divided into teams. (See team instructions below.) One at a time, have each student come up to the front of the class and draw a card from the stack of verb cards. Then the student must act out, or "pantomime," the word on the card.
The other students call out the word the student is acting out. The first person to call out the correct verb earns 1 point.
Then the same student who pantomimed the verb chooses and then acts out the word on his or her adverb card. The student must act it out as it relates to the verb that was just pantomimed.
As the student pantomimes his or her verb/adverb combination, others call out guesses for the adverb. When somebody guesses the correct adverb, that person earns 2 points.
Use this activity to instruct students about the role of adverbs: Adverbs modify or limit the action (verb) that is taking place in a sentence; adverbs provide more specific information about how that action is being carried out. For example, eating is an action everyone can visualize. But the action of eating can be carried out in many different ways. Eating swiftly creates a very different visual image than the image you get of someone eating thoughtfully or noisily or greedily Each of those adverbs modifies the verb eating in a different way.
Part of the fun of this game is that the verb-adverb combinations students draw from the stacks of cards don't always fit together. For example, a student might have to act out eat suspiciously or scream calmly.
Playing the Game in Teams
Students also can play the game in two or more teams. If playing in teams, you will want to alternate students, calling one student from each team before calling a second student from any team. You might give each student's team the first chance to guess the verb and adverb he or she is acting out. If a teammate does not guess the word by the end of a set time limit, then anyone on another team can call out the word and win those points.
6. Sentence Bus
Focus: Parts of Speech
So, every sentence follows a certain order. Simple sentences usually start with a subject, followed by an auxiliary verb, verb, and object. In between these components, we inject other parts such as adverbs, adjectives, prepositions, and interjections.
After explaining sentence structure and parts of speech, you can do the following steps to engage the students in Sentence Bus:
- Draw a bus on the board. Draw the number of seats according to the level of complexity of sentences you are teaching your students.
- Label these seats as Subject, Verb, Adjective, and other parts of the sentence.
- Write a random, jumbled up sentence and words at the bottom of the board and ask the students to get these passengers seated on their designated seats.
- After that, let them read their conjured up sentence using the sentence structure.
Be ready to hear some funny combinations especially if you are using adjectives in these sentences.
7. Adjective/ Adverb Race
Focus: Duh…
This is similar to a typical vocabulary race in which two different teams of students compete against each other in finding more qualifiers.
But, it has a twist!
You can make it a solo activity, where a single student from each team comes to the board and list all adjectives (or adverbs) that come to their mind. Or it can be a group activity where the student on the board receives examples from his/her teammates.
But where is the twist?
It lies in the restriction that the students will only define the word you have assigned.
- Start with making two teams of students.
- Call both to the board and assign different nouns (verb) to them.
- Ask them to qualify these words only according to the qualities they attract.
- Every qualifier will attract a definite mark and the team with the most qualifiers will win.
8. Synonym Scramble
Before the Lesson
This fun activity requires advance preparation of a deck of cards. You'll need one card for each student and one for yourself. The prep is simple:
- Make a list of synonym word pairs that are appropriate for your grade level. Examples:
sad and unhappy
mistake and error
sleepy and drowsy
perhaps and maybe
A thesaurus is a great and easy source for finding grade-appropriate synonym pairs.You'll find two lists below, one for use with students in grades 2 to 4 and the other for use in grades 5 and up.
- Use a blue marker to write on blank index cards or 3- x 5 paper the first word in one of the synonym pairs. (For example, write sad on the first card, mistake on the second card, sleepy on the third card) Keep the cards in order.
- Use a red marker to write on the back of the first card the second word in the second synonym pair on your list (error). Continue by writing, in sequence, the second words in each synonym pair. So, on the back of mistake is drowsy; on the back of sleepy is maybe. On the last card, write the second synonym in the first word pair on the list -- in the example above, it would be unhappy.
Now you're ready to play the game!
The Lesson
Mix up the cards and distribute them to students, one card per student -- don't forget one for yourself. Have students look at the blue word on the card they hold. Start the game by showing and calling out the red word on your card. The students must look at their cards to see who has the blue word that is a synonym for the word you call out. That student should call out the synonym.
For example, if you show and call out the word error, the student who is holding the blue word that is a synonym for error -- in this example, mistake -- must call out that word.
Then, the student holding the card on which was written the synonym for your card (mistake) flips over his or her card and reads the red word (drowsy) on the back. Students look at their cards to see if they hold the blue word that is a synonym for drowsy. The game continues until you have gone all the way through the deck of cards.
Variations on the Game
- Time students to see how long it takes them to complete the game. When the game is finished, collect the cards and redistribute them so students have a different card than the one they held in the first game. Play the game again. Try to beat the time it took to play the first round.
- Prepare several decks of cards and play the game with different sets of synonyms.
- Make the game more challenging by selecting difficult synonym pairs.
- Play the same game using antonyms (opposites).
- Play the game using words and their definitions.
- Play the game using foreign language synonyms; or foreign language verbs and their English meanings.
Sample Synonym Pairs Use a thesaurus to create a grade-appropriate list of synonyms.
You might use an online thesaurus. In addition, some versions of Microsoft Word have their own easy-to-use thesaurus. Simply click Tools in the menu bar, then choose Spelling and Grammar, and Language.
I used a thesaurus to create the synonym lists below. The first list might be appropriate to use in grades 2-4.
| center, middle | damp, wet | hurry, rush |
| gaze, stare | hear, listen | lost, missing |
| lump, chunk | odd, strange | stop, halt |
| paw, foot | paste, glue | present, gift |
| quick, fast | get, receive | funny, silly |
| sad, unhappy | small, little | smile, grin |
| stay, wait | stream, creek | tow, pull |
| pick, choose | lid, cover | neighborhood, community |
| big, large | harm, hurt | fire, blaze |
| fight, battle | hate, dislike | crash, smash |
This list might be appropriate to use in grades 5 and up.
| disappear, vanish | caution, care | petty, unimportant |
| copy, duplicate | danger, hazard | distribute, dispense |
| divide, separate | hesitant, indecisive | inappropriate, improper |
| poison, toxin | ponder, contemplate | prison, penitentiary |
| substitute, replacement | sudden, unexpected | tough, rugged |
| weaken, undermine | veer, swerve | natural, organic |
| inspect, examine | insult, offend | clench, squeeze |
9. Friends
Focus: Subject-Verb Agreement
In this activity, students will match subjects with their appropriate verbs and auxiliary verbs.
One of the hardest parts of English for my students is to choose appropriate verb forms for different subjects. I often get sentences where the pronoun ‘she’ is followed by the verb ‘play’ in the simple present tense.
How do you make them practice? The following is a cool grammar activity to help them with matching verbs to their subjects.
Again, you can do this activity on board or you can create your own worksheets.
- Name the tense you want to practice for the day.
- Write ten to fifteen subjects including nouns and pronouns, a similar number of verbs, and adverbs.
- Ask each student to make as many groups of friends as they can from these words in proper order.
- So the word “plays” can befriend ‘he’, ‘she’, ‘it’, and any singular noun you have used.
- In a worksheet scenario, you can compare the group of friends your students make and declare the winner.
A proper noun is a noun that names a specific person, place, or thing.
After introducing the concept and providing examples of proper nouns use this gallery walk activity to help build/reinforce students' awareness of the concept.
Arrange students into groups of three or four. Provide each group with a different colored marker or crayon. Post around the room large sheets of chart paper. Each sheet of paper should have at the top one of the "Proper Noun Gallery Walk Activity Sheet Headings" listed below. Post the same number of sheets as you have groups of students.
Nine sheets are listed below. If you only have six groups of students, eliminate some of the headings.
-- You might combine State, Country, and City Names into one large category, "Place Names."
-- Or you might include eliminate Vehicle Names and include it among the proper noun categories included under the "Other Proper Nouns" heading.
No matter how many headings you use, be sure to include one sheet of paper that is headed "Other Proper Nouns." That will accommodate a wide variety of proper nouns not included in other categories.
Proper Noun Gallery Walk Activity Sheet Headings
- State Names
- Country Names
- City Names
- Bodies of Water
- Team Names
- Company Names
- Languages
- Vehicle Names
- Other Proper Nouns -- Do not give students any hints about what "other" proper nouns might be listed there. Just see what they come up with. This sheet could capture a wide variety of proper nouns, including days of the week, months of the year, holidays, religions, names of special awards, club names, ship names, specific names of landmarks and buildings, names of specific products
When groups are set, each with a different colored marker or crayon, assign each group to a chart. Give students five minutes to write on the chart all the proper nouns they can come up with that fit under that heading.
It might help if the first group at each chart writes closest to the top of the chart. Then each subsequent group can add their lists under the previous group's list. That will make it easy if you wish to tally each group's contributions at the end of the activity.
Also, to avoid confusion, You might want to have one member of each group serve as the recorder for that group. Groups might change recorders from chart to chart so each student gets an opportunity to write.
At the end of five minutes, have each group tally and record the number of proper nouns it wrote and circle the number. Then have all groups shift to the next chart to their right. Give them five minutes to review what the previous group has written and to add new proper nouns to that list.
At the end of five minutes, call time, and have all groups tally their contributions and shift to the next chart to their right. Continue until all groups have had five minutes to add to each chart. Adding to some of the charts is likely to get progressively more difficult.
When the activity is complete, share each chart with all the students. Draw attention to errors, clear up misconceptions, and reinforce rules for recognizing proper (vs. common) nouns. Adjust the groups' tallies accordingly.
Pay a little extra attention to the chart with the "Other Proper Nouns" heading. Bring up any of the categories of "other proper nouns" that students might have omitted. Did they include days of the week, months of the year, holidays, religions, names of special awards, club names, ship names, specific names of landmarks and buildings, names of specific products?
Let students tally the totals for each group to see which group came up with the most proper nouns.
When completed, the activity should have clarified for students the concept of the proper noun.
I hope that you enjoyed this article and it was able to help you with your teaching or learning of English.
Good luck.
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