Wanna know why Would You Rather game cards can really help your students to start talking if they are reluctant to? I will tell you right now! Because these are fun topics to talk about, and they are easy. Those are the two ingredients you need to get a student that doesn’t want to practice speaking in the target language to do just that!
I know how hard it is to get some students to speak the target language. They find it hard because they don’t know how to do it, and they don’t want to make mistakes in front of others, more importantly. But practice makes perfect. They NEED to practice speaking if they are ever going to learn to communicate in the target language. So we have to help students overcome their reluctance. A game like Would You Rather is excellent for this purpose! Let me tell you why.
Before you read on, I also love whiteboard marker games! Grab my free PDF of the Best Whiteboard Marker Games by clicking here!
Would You Rather card game instructions
The game works like this: A student picks a card from the stack and asks the question out loud. A question will always start with “Would you rather”, from which follow two options to choose from. For example, on a card could be ‘Would you rather stay inside all day, or outside?’ Students must then make a choice and discuss why they choose one over the other. The goal should be to persuade the other players that your choice is the best one.
Benefits of Would You Rather game cards
So what are the benefits of playing this game in class:
- It’s entertaining. Games are just fun!
- There’s movement in it. Kids like to move, and research shows that people learn better when the whole body is involved.
- It helps develop imagination and creativity, as students really have to come up with good reasons for their choices.
- The game will help develop social skills, because students must listen to one another and see each other’s point of view.
- It works super well as a brain break from boring work!
On top of that, the situations in this game are easy to imagine for kids, so it’s easy to talk about. This will help reluctant students give their input quicker. The game also provides a low pressure situation to practive speaking in, since we are ‘only playing a game’, and nobody is paying attention to whether they are speaking correctly. It’s all about just getting some words out.
That’s why I think this game is just the best!
So much so that I created my own version of this game, which you can purchase in my TPT store. It’s a Would You Rather game cards pdf you can download and print for your students in two different ways. Print the entire sheets (there are 5 of them) with 6 prompts per sheet, or print the prompts off as cards. Both give 30 different prompts.
Or go the Amazon route, which I have also done, haha. I bought my game like 10 years ago, so that one is no longer for sale, unfortunately. It was the Would you rather game red and blue style in the picture below. But you can get other ones, among which is the game on the right in the picture, which I love as well, because it doubles as a set of playing cards. Plus there are 52 prompts, so that is a lot to work with!
Related articles:
Why Who Is It is such a great lesson activity and speaking game
And Why this is hands down the best question game to play in class
