Whether you are teaching ESL abroad, Spanish in the U.S., or French in Canada, here is a list of some of my favorite outdoor games for language classes.
Whenever I can, I take my classes outside to play games in the target language. At the beginning of the year, playing games builds classroom community, creates a fun environment, and helps us escape the heat of a school building that isn’t air-conditioned. If you have long block periods of 70 minutes or more, this is also a great way to provide movement and a brain break to improve focus.
All of these games can be modified to fit the language you teach and the level of your students. I’ve played these with elementary students to seniors in high school and they are popular with all ages. Although, I did notice some of the games that require lots of running are more popular with younger students than high school students.
Language Games and Activities with Chalk (Best for just about anything)
Nothing brings back childhood like drawing with chalk. Chalk is inexpensive and you can use it to make just about any lesson more fun.
Here are some ideas:
- Dictation. For beginners, say letters to spell out words. For more advanced students, say a sentence in the target language and have students spell it out with the correct spelling and accents.
- Describe something for students to draw. This works well with vocabulary that is easy to draw, like food or things in a house. It also can be good to practice prepositions of location or geographical terms.
- Play a game of Twister. Review colors and body parts by playing the classic game of Twister (right hand on yellow, left leg on green) but draw out a massive board with chalk so all your students can play at once.
- Hopscotch with vocab or verb conjugations. Have students create their own hopscotch board but instead of numbers when a square is hopped on, students have to say a vocabulary word or yell out a conjugated verb.
Planning on going outside but instead you’re stuck with rainy day? Mix things up by playing one of these fun online language games.
Spud (Best for numbers)
This game is great for complete beginners who are learning numbers. Start by counting off and giving all players a number. I make sure to ask a lot of “who is number X?” questions to get in lots of language repetitions and be assured that students remember their number.
Next, get in a rough circle with the teacher in the middle. The teacher has a small or medium-sized ball that is soft. The teacher throws the ball up in the air and calls out a number. Be sure to throw the ball straight up so it lands more or less where it was thrown. The teacher who threw the ball and everyone whose number was not called runs away in any direction they can.
The person whose number was called needs to run into the middle of the circle and grab the ball as fast as they can. As soon as they have control of the ball they yell “freeze!” When the participants who are running away hear “freeze”, they need to stop in place as soon as possible.
With everyone frozen, the person with the ball gets to take three steps to the person closest to them that they are going to try to hit. This is obviously another good opportunity to get in repetitions of 1, 2, 3 and have everyone count as the person takes their large steps. They throw the ball, trying to hit a person. If they succeed, the person that was hit is the next person to throw. If they don’t hit anyone then they have to be the person in the middle who throws the ball up for the next round.
In the case of a big class, you may want to split your class up and play two simultaneous games so more people get a chance to have their number called. If your students already know basic numbers, give them a random range of large numbers to play with, like 126-144.
Color Pompon (Best for colors and/or clothing)
I definitely remember loving to play this one in gym class! It’s perfect to practice colors, but if your students are not complete beginners then you can also use clothing or clothing and colors.
Mark off a rectangular court about 200 feet long. You can use something with pre-made markings like a basketball court, or have students put their backpacks down to mark the corners.
One person is “it” and they stand in the middle of the court. Everyone else stands behind the line of the court the long way. The person who is it calls a color. Everyone who is wearing anything that contains that color has to run to the other side, trying to avoid being tagged by the person who is it. They cannot round out of the boundaries of the court. If they make it to the other side safely, they stay until the others are all called and are safe for that round. If they are tagged before reaching the other side, they join the person who is “it” as a tagger.
Everyone who was not wearing the color that was called stays where they are and doesn’t run. The “it” person will call a new color and the process repeats a few times. If “color pompon” is called, everyone has to run. Think of some fun word in the target language instead of color pompon.
Once all the people that were originally on one side have either made it to the other side or been tagged, the person who is “it” turns around and continues to call colors, this time with a lot more helpers. After a few rounds, the last person to be tagged is the winner and gets to be the next “it” person.
Direct your partner (Best for directions)
Students get with a partner. One partner closes their eyes. The other partner uses the target language to direct their partner to a predetermined place using simple commands like forward, right, stop, etc.
If you only have a big field without any interesting obstacles, try placing student backpacks on the ground in rows to require more difficult navigation.
Grab the Bandana (Best for verb conjugations)
A Spanish colleague recently reminded me of this game, which I first saw at the elementary school I worked at in Spain. She does it with verb conjugations, which would work well if you had a small class of less than 20 or could split your class into two groups.
The teacher or a trusted student stands in the middle with a bandana, scarf or ribbon. Students form two lines facing the teacher and the other line of students. Each student in each line is given a pronoun (I, you, he, etc.) in the target language. The teacher calls a conjugated verb and the two students (one from each line) that have that pronoun have to run to be the first to grab the bandana from the teacher.
With younger students or with languages that don’t have differences in oral verb conjugations, you can just give each student a different vocabulary word or even numbers to practice listening for their word.
What time is it Mr. Fox? (Best for telling time)
This is another elementary school gym class classic. One student (or the teacher to start) is Mr. Fox. They are 100-200 feet from everyone else, and they have their back turned to them so they can’t see them. Use two backpacks to mark out a line that students need to stay behind to start. This is also the “safe” line.
All together students yell “What time is it, Mr. Fox?” Mr. Fox, without turning around, loudly yells a time like “3:00”. Students take as many steps towards Mr. Fox as the time he said, so 3 steps for 3:00, 7 steps for 7:00, etc.
Once everyone has taken their steps they again all ask “What time is it Mr. Fox?” and follow his instructions. After three or four times like this, there may be daring students who are near Mr. Fox. When Mr. Fox thinks students are close to him, instead of answering with a time, he’ll respond by yelling “midnight”, turn around quickly and try to tag students. Students will turn around and run back to the safe line. Whoever gets tagged first is the next Mr. Fox.
Culturally authentic lawn games (Best for culture, game vocabulary)
Most cultures have games similar to horseshoes or corn hole that you could play with some degree of modifications. Bocci ball from Italy, croquet from France, and tejo from Colombia (minus the gunpowder ;)) are all outdoor lawn games you could play with your students.
I hope this post encourages you to try some outdoor games for your language classes. Do you have any outdoor games you’d recommend? Let me know in the comments below.
