[Manuela]

With children (8 - 12), even with true beginners I like teaching them how to introduce themselves : "I'm Mary"
" I'm Bill" then have them shake hands with me in turn and say "Nice to meet you" "Nice to meet you too". THe whole class helps out the children who are shy.
Then I teach them to clap hands, shake their shoulders, snap their fingers, shake their heads, shout OK, slap their knees, stretch their arms etc when they respond correctly to these orders I sing " If you're happy and you know it" and they just do the actions.
If there are books to hand out I also teach them
"Here you are" Thank you" "Not at all"
So by the end of the first hour they can introduce themselves, offer things,say thank you and respond politely to that and can understand a number of orders that get them familiarised with parts of their bodies.

I liked the two activities listed above in this thread, a lot. Have tried out the
the Snowball thing, didn't know it was called like this. It' s an activity that comes in handy for revising vocabulary learnt so far too.