Read what a teacher says about this activity:
‘Things that are … is a fun way to get learners to develop their thinking skills through asking questions. It gets learners to formulate questions based on the answers they receive.’
Stage 1: Prepare
Choose a colour, e.g. red, blue or yellow.
Stage 2: Do task 1
Say: ‘Work individually and make a list of five things that are [colour].’ The time limit should be short to make the activity more fun.
The number of items on the list can change depending on the category you choose. For example, there are more green things than purple things!
Stage 3: Introduce task 2
Put learners in pairs and say: ‘Don’t show your list to your partner.’
Say: ‘The aim of the activity is to try and guess the most things on your partner’s list.’ Set a time limit of five minutes.
For example, with ‘red’ items.
A: Can you eat it?
B: Yes.
A: Is it a fruit?
B: Yes.
A: Does it grow on trees?
B: No.
A: Is it a kind of berry?
B: Yes.
A: Is it a strawberry?
B: Yes. You guessed it. Can you guess my next thing?
Stage 4: Do task 2
Give learner A in each pair five minutes to guess. After the time limit swap roles with learner B guessing. At the end, find out who guessed the most.
You can also do this activity with other categories. Here are some ideas: Things that are … round, tasty, hard to do, fun, boring, interesting, expensive to do, dangerous, wooden, metal, soft, from space, found in a river, long, found in nature, in my bag, in my house.
Of course, some of these categories are more difficult to check and some are subjective.