ESL Teaching Activities and Games

Below you will find a growing list of ESL activities to help you make the most your time in class.

ESL Activities for Vocabulary

The vocabulary our students learn are an important part of the foundation for speaking, listening, reading & writing. Be sure your students are fluent with their words with these engaging vocabulary activities.

ESL Activities for Speaking & Grammar

Getting ESL students speaking can be a challenge. Students are afraid to look silly or make mistakes. Use these speaking activities to get your students speaking a lot during class using target vocabulary and grammar.

ESL Activities for Reading

Reading is an incredibly important skill for our ESL students. They need to read texts that are often quite a bit above their English level. Help your students improve their decoding and comprehension with these reading activities.

ESL Activities for Writing

Writing is one of the more difficult skills to teach our ESL students. They need to write a lot and learn from their mistakes and be challenged to use academic language that they may find very challenging. Check out some of these activities to get some direction.

ESL Activities for Conversation

Speaking is a lot more than just vocabulary and grammar. Students need to learn how to communicate ideas, understand others and be understood. These conversation activities focus on the more natural side of speaking English.

ESL Activities for Distance Learning Online

Teaching online is a challenge. Distance learning is a growing trend to be sure, but, there are times when it becomes a necessity. Give the activities below a try to help engage your students and help them improve their English skills online.

Engaging and Productive ESL/ELL Activities

Activities and games can make a huge difference in your ESL classes, keeping your students engaged and energetic.

But having a good time isn't enough.

We need to make sure that our activities and games really help students improve in their English skills. 

One of the biggest issues I see when I observe teachers is that their activities involve one or two students at a time while everyone else waits around.

Finding ways to involve all students during activities makes a huge difference in the effectiveness of our activities.

That is why you will see that most of the activities I suggest here put the responsibility to moderate the activities with the students. 

When students moderate the activities, the teacher is freed up to go around and help individuals who need help and build relationships with students who might feel alienated.

Be sure to bookmark this page so that you can find it when you need it as well as see when new activities are added.

You can also read more about how to set up your ESL activities so that they are fun and effective here.