Are you looking for a fun way to practice speaking in English with your students? Try this super easy game! I call it “Meet me in numbers” and I play it with every new group I get to introduce myself. It’s a great way to share some things about myself while getting them to practice asking questions in English.
When I first started teaching I got my students to do the speaking exercises we found in our textbooks. You know, those tasks that can be super artificial, inauthentic and forced? They were about things my students didn’t actually want to know about, so why bother having those conversations? But I found they did like to practice speaking in a playful way. With games! How to practice speaking in English with this fun game, you ask? Let me tell you how to play!
This is a whiteboard game. If you want to learn about 6 more fun Whiteboard Marker Games, check out my PDF of those by clicking here!
Practice speaking skills in a fun way
How to learn speaking in English? By playing a game! I know several, some of which I describe on this blog. If you click this link it will take you to my article on English language games. And others are up in my store, check those out here. But today I want to tell you about an absolutely free and super easy to play one: Meet me in numbers.
Step 1: Think of 4 people you know in various ways. For example, I usually choose my mom, Irene, my best friend Sanne, my boyfriend Julian, and my sister Maxine. I list them on the big board for all students to see.
Step 2: Think of 4 numbers, each one corresponding in some way to one of the names. For example, I will write down 65 because that’s my mom’s age, 6 because that’s how long I’ve been with my boyfriend, 18 because that’s how long I’ve known my best friend, and 26 because that’s my sister’s age. I list those numbers on the board to, next to the names, but not next to the names they correspond with.
So in this example, the board will look like this:
Irene 26
Sanne 6
Julian 65
Maxine 18
Step 3: Students must ask questions in order to find out a couple of things. They must find out who the names are for. And they must uncover what the numbers are for. And then they have to discover what the right combinations are for. So it’s a mystery they have to solve!
This is one of my favorite speaking practice exercises with students because it’s got it all: using our language skills and vocabulary as well as getting to know more about people. After I’ve shown students how to play, they can then, at a later stage, play in their small groups. I will give each small group a little dry erase board, and they will each come up with names and numbers for their group to ask them about.
How to learn to speak in English fluently
So if you’re asking me how to learn speaking in English fluently, it’s: play those games! It’s a low pressure activity to do, because students must ask questions, but most of them will not yield the right answer. It is fun to get to know each other, so players will want to ask more to find out more. And students will speak and listen to a lot of English at the same time, thus internalizing the language better.
Give it a go!
Related articles on speaking practice:
My board games are my absolute favorite games for class
Why this is hands down the best question game for the classroom
How a game of Which Would You Rather can improve your students’ fluency
Why Who Is It is such a great activity and speaking game
