Students find out as much information about their partner’s weekend / holiday as possible, then tell the rest of the class and answer questions.

Procedure

Put students into pairs (A and B). Tell students to discuss their weekend / holiday with their partner. Suggest the following topics: visiting the cinema, a foreign country, a tourist attraction, a restaurant, going to a party, playing sport etc. 

  • Give students 5 - 10 minutes to complete this activity. Tell students to swap roles halfway. Circulate to help with vocabulary and grammar etc.
  • Divide the group into two teams (A and B). Draw a scoreboard on the board to record points for each team. Choose a student from Team A. Ask the student to describe their partner’s weekend / holiday using the third person to the whole class. Time the students and stop them after two minutes.
  • After the student from Team A has finished speaking, one by one each person in Team B (excluding the speaker's partner) should take it in turns to ask the speaker a question. The speaker must answer based on what he or she has learned or if the answer is unknown, he or she should invent the answer. Then, verify the answer with the student’s partner, and if it is correct, the speaker's group gets one point.

NB: Ensure that students use the third person when asking and responding to questions. Model the dialogue below as an example.

Example:

Team A speaker: John went to Rome at the weekend.
Team B member: Did John visit the Colosseum when he was in Rome?
Team A speaker: Yes, he did. He said it was fantastic.
Teacher: Is that correct John?
John: Yes, it is.

The teacher awards a point to Team A.

Team B member: Did John eat lasagne when he was in Rome?
Team A speaker: Err, (I don’t know)...Yes, he did.
Teacher: John. Did you eat lasagne in Rome?
John: No, I didn’t, but I ate some delicious spaghetti.

No points are awarded.

NB: If you have a large class, limit the number of speakers (students could nominate a given number of speakers within their group) and limit the number of questions asked by the opposing team.

Continue in this way, alternating teams and encouraging creative questions. The winning team is the team with the most points after each member of their team has spoken.

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