Its main use is in listening skills development. It is closely related to question styles often found in EFL exams, but could be easily adapted for other listening work.
Preparation
- Choose a lexical set, such as feelings, places, jobs, etc. For example:
- feelings: happy, excited, sad, disappointed, bored, fascinated …
- places: a bank, a petrol station, a school, a hospital …
- jobs: a doctor, a shop assistant, a bus conductor, an office worker …
- Write each word on a separate piece of paper. You need one set per small group of students.
Procedure
- Place the students in small groups and put the words face down in a pile on their table.
- One student in the group takes a piece of paper and says something that would be spoken in the context given by the word. For example, if a student picks the word doctor, they can say I'll give you these, and you need to take them twice a day, before meals.
- The other students have to guess the word. The fastest student to say it wins a point.
- Continue with students taking turns to take a piece of paper and make a sentence.
You could use more than one context at a time, but be sure the students know which lexical sets are in use.
Once students are used to this kind of activity, you should find that pre-listening tasks such as 'Predicting the language used in an argument between a parent and a teenager' are more fruitful.
Language Level