We have all had those classes when we have prepared well, yet for one reason or another, there is still time which needs to be filled – one of the best ways to fill that gap is through the use of games which can last as long or as short as you need. Check out the 5 classic classroom fillers that any teacher on Earth knows about below!

1. SIMON SAYS

You may well remember this game from being at school and although it is commonly used for younger students, it can also be adapted with more complex commands for older learners.

To play, one person is the leader ( this can be the teacher to start with and then once students understand the game they can take over to be the leader )

The leader is the one who says the commands. The rest of the class carries out the action, but only when the command is started with the words “ Simon says “ ( you can change the name “ Simon “ into a more common name in your setting )

For example, the leader says

“Simon says point to your nose” – everyone should point to their nose

“ point to your nose “ – students should not point to their nose

If the student carries out the action and the leader did not start with the words “ Simon says … “ then they are out of the game.

To make the game more difficult, you can speed up the actions. The winner of the game is the person who is left at the end of the game.

Simon says is a great simplest interactive game among the classic classroom fillers

2. PICTIONARY

This is a great game to practice vocabulary and can be used as an assessment tool to see if students can recall the keywords you have taught them.

To play you simply write words on small pieces of paper ( these can be words that have been recently taught or words in general ) These are then folded over and put into a box or a bag ( so that students are not able to see the words )

Divide the class into two teams and allocate a section of the board for each of the teams.

One participant from each team then comes forward, receives a whiteboard marker and takes a piece of paper. At the teachers start instruction, the participant opens the paper and starts to draw the word as a picture on the board.

No letters are allowed to be drawn and the participant drawing is not allowed to say anything. The other students have to guess from the drawing what the word is, shouting out answers as the participant is drawing.

The winner is the team that guesses the word first. They get one point and another student is called on to be the person who draws.

This game can thus continue for as short or as long as you like and is a great vocabulary builder as well as a lot of fun.

Pictionary can be used as a simple assessment tool

3. BOARD RACE- the champion among the most  well-known classroom fillers

This is a very popular game as it is very interactive which students enjoy as well as developing writing, listening and vocabulary skills- which helps the teacher.

Divide the class into teams ( depending on the size of your class ) Allocate a section of the board to each of the teams.

To play, the teacher stands at the front of the class next to the board. A student from each of the teams also comes to the front of the class and is given a whiteboard marker – these students will be racing against each other.

The teacher then asks a question – it can be vocabulary based e.g. write a word which is a fruit/spelling related e.g. spell “ afternoon “ / grammatical related e.g. how to structure a verb tense using the noun and verb that the teacher says.

The teacher then gives the signal to indicate students should start and on the signal they answer the question on the board and race back to their team. The winner is the team which is the fastest ( with the correct answer ) This can be repeated for the next student with another question being given.

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To make the game more competitive you can also have a game which requires passing on the pen to the next student in the team  through, for example, asking pupils to write ten words ( one student – one word ) in a specific category – for example, the winner is the first team to write ten words relating to things you find in the house etc

This can be developed even further with the teacher giving the students a category e.g. animals – and students taking it in turns to write an animal word starting with a / the next with b etc.

The board race game is suitable for all ages and abilities

4. HANGMAN

A completely different style of game is the hangman. Although a popular game it is difficult to keep up the exciting pace for too long so is more of a short filler.

To play this game, the teacher thinks of a word ( to make it easier the teacher can give the students the category if desired) and then put the corresponding number of dashes on the board to show the number of letters. For example, if your word is “elephant” ( within the category of animals ) then you need to write eight dashes.

Students then suggest a letter and if it is found in the word then it is completed in the corresponding space. For example, if the students suggest the letter “ e “ then  you fill in – e __ e _ __ ___ ___ __ _

If the letter is not in the word then you write this letter on the board and start to draw the corresponding lines to draw the image of a hanging man. There are eleven lines to complete the hangman ( see below ) – which means that the students are able to say eleven letters that do not appear in the word before the game is finished.

5. HOT SEAT

Another great game for vocabulary building is the hot seat game, however, unlike the other games which focus on writing, this game focuses on listening and speaking.

To play, you first divide the class into teams, dependent on the size of the class. One member from each of the teams then comes to the front of the class and sits in the” hot seats “ which are chairs placed in front of the board ( so that the students cannot see the board )

The teacher then writes a word on the board so that the students can see it but the “ hot seater “ can’t. The aim of the game is for the hot seater to work out the word.

There are various ways that this game can be played. The first is for students to describe the word to the hot seater without saying or spelling out the word so that the hot seater says the word.

For example, if the word is “ seed “ then the students may suggest sentences such as “ it grows in the ground “ / “ you plant this and it becomes a plant / it is very small etc.

An alternative way is for the hot seater to ask the rest of the class questions. For example, they can ask questions such as “am I living ? / can you eat me ? do I live in the jungle etc “ The rest of the class is only able to answer yes or no in response to these questions.

To increase the difficulty, you can give the students a set time limit to guess the word.

Using these classroom fillers is an excellent way to increase speaking ability too

Overall, simple games which need little or no preparation and can be adapted to the size of your class and ability are an invaluable resource – make sure you have these games memorized so that whenever you have a spare five minutes you are not struggling to fill in the time but instead can quickly and easily tap into your game knowledge and transform your ESL classroom in a place of educational fun.

A game not only is a very useful backup but also a great way to add energy to a lesson as well as being a more relaxing way to learn. Once you start looking online you will find thousands of games that you can play – both online and in-person, so take the time to find things that appeal to your teaching style and the needs of the students.

The important thing with games is to make sure that students understand the purpose and instructions on how to play these classroom fillers. The easiest way to explain this is through a demonstration practice in which you walk the students through the activity as a dry run first.