I came across an activity on theteachertoolkit.com called Nothing Ventured. The wheels started turning right away as I thought of the ways that it could be used in a language classroom. There are lot of useful ideas on the Teacher Toolkit website, but they are not specific to language teaching. No fear. I got you covered.
I got to work creating a template to use with my students in the target language. I also put together templates in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German and Italian. You can download them all here and it also includes the directions for the doing the activity in your classroom.
I chose the title The Die Decides for my take on this activity. I’m always looking for ways to incorporate different materials and that little die can be used for so much. I’m happy to have yet another way to put it to use.
The Die Decides is an interactive activity that can be used for almost any topic in your language class, such as:
- practicing vocabulary themes
- practicing language structures
- assessing understanding after reading or listening
- reviewing before an assessment
The teacher creates the questions based on the topic being covered.
How the activity works
- Individual students, pairs or small groups each need a six-sided die and a “The Die Decides” sheet.
- Players (individual, pair or group) roll the die before each question is presented either verbally or in writing. They record the number rolled in the “Die” column of their sheet.
- The teacher says or shows a question (perhaps projected). Students discuss, if in pairs or groups, and write their answer in the “Answer” column of their sheet.
- The teacher says or shows the correct answer to the question. It can also be part of the projection slides or simply written on the board. Students check their answer and determine whether they were correct or incorrect. The teacher should be vigilant to make sure answer are not altered.
- If the answer is correct, players get the points that they rolled prior to the question being asked. If they are incorrect, they lose those points.
- Students then update their total as they continue on with each question.
- The player (individual, pair or group) with the most points after all the questions have been asked wins the game.
Students enjoy this activity and use so much language as they discuss possible answers, listen to and read questions and react to their points changing as they progress through the game. Remember that you can download templates in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German and Italian.