Lesson Plans | Endangered animal bingo, little presidents, and pranks – Part 1

I’ve been focusing on doing more games and avoided doing bingo all year, but decided to finally give it a try and was pleasantly surprised. I also got to prank the students and hear about what they’d do if they were president.

Endangered animal bingo

Materials:

Bingo boards (15 would have been plenty)

Calling cards (cut out pictures of animals)

Pieces to mark boards (aka strips of scrap paper that we cut into markers)

Introduction:

• I’d write “extinction” on the board and ask them if they knew what it was. They sometimes would, but if they struggled to explain, I’d ask them for examples, and they’d often come up with “dinosaurs” and “dodo.” I’d ask what type of animal a dodo was and get them to say the word “bird.” I’d then write a “0” next to “extinction” to show that a species was completely eliminated.
  • If they started saying “elephant,” “panda,” etc. I’d write those animals on the bottom of the board and come back to them.
• Next, I’d write “endangered” on the board and say that there were a “few” animals left. They often didn’t know what “few” meant, so I’d draw a nifty diagram to help them out, and then use a lot of hand gestures. We’d list examples here.
• Causes of extinction/endangerment:
  • I’d then ask how the dinosaurs became extinct and they’d usually say “meteorite” or “asteroid” (though I got some other weird answers for this one). I’d then ask why pandas were endangered, sometimes pretending to be a lumberjack to get them to “cutting trees” or “deforestation” (which is the same in French. Whoo!). When we’d get to elephants, they’d often try out “chausseur” or “ivore,” so I’d help them get to “hunting” and “ivory.”

Next, we’d go through the rules of bingo. There were some who knew how to play (and kept saying that it was the “loto”), but others didn’t seem to have played it before. I’d pick up an animal and read it out, then tear off a piece of paper and place it over the right square on my bingo board. Then I’d tell them that if they got 5 in a line horizontally, vertically, or diagonally, they should raise their hands and say “Bingo!” I’d also draw this out on the blackboard or demonstrate by pointing at my board.

Then we’d finally start playing. I’d have a student come pick out a calling card (one class in particular developed a “technique” for this, choosing cards at the bottom of the pile). I would try to make sure that they wouldn’t show the picture to the rest of the class and were instead actually listening to the name of the animal. I’d also ask follow up questions about the animals (what “type” of animal is it, where does it live, etc.) or about words contained in the name of the animal.

I’d generally repeat the name as well to help out and go around to make sure everyone understood what to do. Some would shout out “Bingo!” or raise their hands every time they had a match, and by this point they’d sometimes all start raising their hands wanting to pick out a card, so I’d tell them that everyone would get a chance.

When a student actually had 5 animals in a row, I’d ask him/her to read the names out loud and I’d sometimes ask the follow-up questions again. One class asked me what they’d win, and I said “pride” and “glory,” which I’m sure they didn’t understand.

I had one class where when I told the students that it was time to switch groups, they told me that the teacher was out and they were the only students around. We played bingo a little longer and then they tried to teach me a game called “Motus,” which I didn’t really understand. They also really enjoyed wiping the board with a wet sponge. Adorable.

I ended up changing the lessons up each day to acknowledge the local election taking place and April Fool’s Day. On April Fool’s Day, I started out some classes by speaking in Spanish. As they streamed in, I’d keep quiet and smile, and at least some of them sensed something was up since I usually greet them all. I don’t know a whole lot more than “Hola, como estas?” so luckily they would sometimes start saying “Poisson avril!” and I’d ask them to explain what that was. They’d tell me that people stick fish on their friends’ backs. I’d ask them to tell me about some other pranks. One class told me about a teacher who pretended to have a big test, and another said something about a penguin smelling a butt and dying (?). I’d tell them it’s called April Fool’s Day in the United States and review the date with them. I asked a couple of classes if they could think of a trick for me to do with the next group, but only one seemed to understand; I told them I’d speak in Spanish and not to tell the next group, but I’m pretty sure at least one of them did right in front of me. We’d then go on with the bingo lesson.

I have one group of older students, so I decided to do something related to elections with them. Check out the next post for more on that!