Six Fun Revision Activities
For the class before the big test
It’s the end of the year, and for many teachers there could be a big test coming up. I always enjoyed revision activities, as they are often much more ‘success-oriented’ in that students have a better chance of getting the right answers since - theoretically at least - they have seen the material already. Here are six of my favourite revision activities for before the big test.
1 Revision Tic tac toe
Draw a 3x3 grid on the board and in each square write a key word for an area you want to revise (e.g. a vocabulary set, a grammar point). Divide the class into two groups, the X’s and the O’s. Groups take turns calling out a square. Give them a revision question from the square. If they answer correctly, they get to put their mark (X or O, I usually let a student come up and write it) on the square. The first team to create a whole line ‘wins’.
2 Revision Roulette
Choose a category of words that you studied that day. Write down one word from that category on a piece of paper and don’t show the students. Students need to call out words from the category. They ‘lose’ if they 1) repeat a word someone else has said 2) can’t think of a word or 3) say the word you had secretly written down.
3 Whistle dictation
Take a reading text that you studied with the class that lesson. Books closed, tell the students you are going to do a special dictation. You will read the text aloud, but you will pause at certain words and ‘whistle’ (or make a beep sound). They listen and write the missing words.
Whistle or beep ‘key content’ or ‘grammar’ words in the text. Students check in pairs.
4 What was the question?
Choose a structure you want to review (e.g. Past simple). Send a student (Student A) out of the class. Write a question on the board that practises the structure (e.g. What did you have for dinner last night?) Ask students to think of their answer.
Erase the question on the board. Call Student A back in. Student A nominates others to give the answer to the question you wrote before. After getting five answers, Student A has to guess the question.
5 Bits and Pieces Revision
For this you need to be able to clip images or exercises from a pdf of your coursebook. Make a slide with images/phrases/sentences from previous unit. Display it and ask students questions like...
What was activity?
What vocab/grammar was involved?
What else was on the page?
What else was in the lesson?
6 A Different Perspective
Find an activity the students did in class. Display it on the screen, but upside down! Can they do it orally together in pairs quickly? This quick little activity actually gets students to really focus on the exercise!