ESL: Warm-up Activities

Improv for EFL/ESL? Indeed! The six improvisation exercises detailed in this resource are intended to provide fluency practice and boost the confidence of all levels of language learners but can be used in drama classes as well.

Once your class sees the intriguing cover for The Phantom of the Opera, they are not going to want to put the book down. Guide high school readers through the abridged version of the novel by Jennifer Bassett with a set of activities for...

Review the vocabulary from Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea with a magic squares activity. To find the magic number, readers match the numbers on a grid with the words and definitions from the novel.

Integrity and selflessness are not always rewarded as they should be in our modern world. Victor Hugo put the spotlight on the weaknesses of society—as well as the strength of the human spirit—in his novel Les Misérables, which is the...

He's here! Experience the thrill of Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera with a series of reading comprehension questions. Each set of questions is based on three-chapter sections, and prompt high schoolers to put events in order,...

Students make sentences out of a list of words their teacher provides. In this making sentences lesson plan, students get points for correct sentences in this ESL warm up.

Poetry is a very personal and introspective art form. Give your class the opportunity to understand how a poet's voice can speak to them on a personal level, and that every reader can respond to an author differently. After a poetic...

Explore connections within and between informational texts with this activity about encyclopedia articles. Middle schoolers write encyclopedia articles focusing on topics in American history. They discuss how to determine credibility...

The New York Times article “Online Diary,” launches this study of websites and how to assess them. Richly detailed, the lesson includes warm-up activities, procedures, journal prompts, discussion questions, and links to valuable...

Give learners a crash course in balancing the books on the United States federal government level with an economics and government resource. Class members engage in a warm-up discussion and brainstorming session before answering...