DIY Board Games

Engaging students in lessons about descriptive language is hard. So, ETA Mary Breen and counterpart Bu Winda planned to bring the topic closer to home by having students talk about places in their city, Manggar. After a spirited game of Simon Says using classroom phrases and objects (to wake up the post-lunch class), they moved to the main lesson: board games.

Using the board games from the Regional English Language Office (RELO) as a guide, students created their board games based on places around town. Students worked in teams to create prompts like “Would you rather visit Lalang or Burung Mandi Beach… and why?” Students drew creative and colorful game boards (one resembling a snake) before exchanging them with classmates. Because of the open-ended questions, students freely used the descriptive language they had worked on for several weeks to have friendly disagreements about the best ice cream shop in town.

Mary is glad to see her students excited to learn English and looks forward to planning more activities this year. Since she likes ice cream, she also has a new list of places to visit!

Mary Breen is currently teaching at SMAN 1 Manggar, East Belitung.

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