When ESL students return to school after the holidays, it’s an excellent opportunity to include activities that are personal to them. Most learners struggle to get back into a school routine after a long break, so by making the first few days fun and meaningful, they can more easily settle into their new grade.
Excellent after-holiday activities for ESL students include presenting their holiday news, postcard writing, planning a schedule for their next holiday, playing sight-translation games using pictures or words, creating a holiday memory book, and creative writing.
ESL students might have visited their home country and spoken their first language more than English. Still, their holiday experiences can be incorporated to make an English lesson more meaningful to them.
So, choosing appropriate activities will encourage an atmosphere of light-hearted fun, acceptance, and guidance ought to be promoted in the classroom.
10 Fun And Meaningful ESL Activities For After The Holidays
Fun and meaningful activities help learners transition from holiday mode to school mode more easily. The following activities will help learners to warm up to their teacher and peers while using English to recall and capture their memories of the holiday.
1. Create A Holiday Review Vlog
Get students to produce a thorough review of their holidays including all the places they went and services they used. Students can compose a script and then record each other giving their reviews.
They can put photos of the places they visited as back drops for their video. I’ve done this on a few occasions now and some of the students really get into it. Some even upload them to YouTube as well.
2. Tweet About Your Holiday
Students get 280 words to write different types of Tweets and classmates vote to see whose tweet was the most attention grabbing. Categories of tweets could include:
- You’ll never guess who I have just seen.
- Complaints about poor service levels.
- Help I’m stuck in a…
- I just had the strangest experience.
- I can’t believe what I just did.
If anyone in the class has a twitter following you can send a few of them out just to see what sort of reaction they get.
3. Present Holiday News
Students who enjoy talking in front of the class can be offered the opportunity to present their holiday news. Some students require no prompting, while others might need some encouragement.
The teacher can display topic pointers to remind students what they can talk about. Examples include where they went, what they did, who they saw, and what they enjoyed the most or least.
The teacher can allow a second day of presentations for the students who have show and tell. For example, some students might have received a special gift or souvenir from the holiday or want to show some photos.
4. Write A Postcard To An English Friend
Writing postcards is a fun and concise writing activity for students, especially after the holidays when they probably haven’t written much. Students can pretend they are still on holiday and write a postcard to an English friend.
In their postcard, they can mention something significant about their holiday, learn how to write their address, and use a short date format.
5. Plan A Schedule For The Next Holiday
Some students might yearn to still be on holiday, so planning a schedule for the next holiday is a great way to get them writing! So, they can write what they want to do in their schedule and prioritize their to-do list.
Then, as an extension activity, they can make notes of any goals they might want to achieve before the next holiday.
6. Play Sight-Translation Games
Sight translation games involve showing a familiar word, object, or picture of something familiar to the class, and they have to tell you what it is in English or their native language, if the teacher is bilingual. The game can be holiday-themed and played as a class, in pairs or groups, or one-on-one.
Sight-translation games can be modified into other games, for example, matching, guessing, or memory games. They can also be used as activities for students to explain different cultural traditions if planned well.
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7. Create A Holiday Memory Book
A holiday memory book is a wonderful way to preserve memories from a holiday and can be an excellent ESL activity. Students can draw pictures, paste photos, or create a virtual scrapbook and write short notes for each image.
Remember to write the date somewhere in the memory book, as it may serve as a keepsake and reminder of the student’s growth and English language development in the future.
8. Creative Writing Activities
Creative writing activities should be adapted according to the age and abilities of the students. The teacher can provide some guidelines and questions regarding the holiday, and the students can choose which they would like to write about. Examples of questions include the following:
- Who did you spend most of your holiday with?
- Where did you go on your holiday?
- What was your favorite part of the holiday?
- What games did you play during the holiday?
9. A Letter Of Complaint
Students can discuss one aspect of their holiday that they were unhappy with. Perhaps this was the accommodation, the food, the waiting time, or whatever. They can then write a letter of complaint to address that specific issue.
If you and them are feeling particularly ambitious then why not complain in real life. Make the phone call in class if you or the student are brave enough. Get the students to plan out what to say and imagine what responses they might get and what to say in return.
Students can the listen in turn as classmates make complaints in real life. This can be a real match winner if your students are up for it.
Also try: English Language Games For Middle School Ages
10. Write A Review
Why not allow your students to compose an online review for Tripadvisor stating their thoughts and feelings of the experiences they had. You can use other people’s reviews as templates and to model the appropriate type of language and then let your student’s loose.
Conclusion
After-holiday activities for ESL students should be fun and meaningful to help them transition into a new school routine.
Some great activities for ESL students after the holidays include presenting their holiday news, writing a postcard to an English friend, planning the schedule for their next holiday, playing holiday-related games, creating a holiday memory book, and creative writing activities.
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Image Credits
Postcard R. Wilkerson & Co., Trowbridge, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
