[sophiie]

This week I tried out a game with my 3ème euro students that we used to play in my French classes at school and I loved! They seemed to really enjoy it so I thought I'd share it here.

I prepared a short piece of text and printed it out four times on small bits of paper. The text can be about anything - mine had a Bonfire Night theme because I did this lesson on the 5th November, so was teaching them about Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot.

It was a class of twelve, and I split them up into four groups of three people. I stuck the four bits of paper at each corner of the room. I had the four teams sit apart from each other around the room and assigned each team their designated bit of paper, which is placed at the furthest point from where they're sat.

ie. if the corners of the room are:
AB
CD

The team in corner A is assigned the paper in corner D; the team in corner B is assigned the paper in corner C, etc.

In each team, one member is the scribe and the other two are the runners. The runners have to go to the piece of paper, read as much as they can remember and then return to their scribe and dictate what's written.

The team to finish first, and the most accurately, wins. I gave the winning team sweets, which I think they also appreciated!

It sounds quite complicated now that it's written down like this, but it's very simple and they seem to like it!

If you're interested, this is the text I used (the length is around 100 words, and you could simplify it or make it more difficult depending on the level):

"The History of 'Bonfire Night'

In November 1605 a group of men decided to make a plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament in London. The men were angry about the way Catholic people were being treated in England. The leader of the gang was called Robert Catesby, and the plan is known as the ‘Gunpowder Plot’. The men put 36 barrels of gunpowder in the Houses of Parliament with the intention of blowing up King James I and his court. Guy Fawkes was the man who was going to light the gunpowder and cause the explosion. However, police found out about the plot and caught all the men involved. They were tortured and killed."

(I took this text from a free lesson plan on the British Council website, and edited it a little.)

Hope you find this useful

[draketw]

we did this in my training, it was a very fun activity, and i feel like i could use it for a good introduction for the days work.

[sweet tooth]

This sounds like a great idea! Am going to try it today with a class for a Bonfire Night activity but will try and simplify the text a little!Thanks!