In your next ESL speaking class, have your students practice more natural conversation with this fun game that will get them speaking, listening to their partner, and responding.

1. Break the students up into pairs or groups of three (or more depending on your way of doing it)
2. Give them a general topic to ask a question about. (ex. What they did last weekend. A movie they've seen recently. Etc)
3. The students are to ask their partner a question and their partner answers.
4. The partner then asks a question based on their answer to continue the conversation moving.
5. The game goes back and forth until one person can't think of anything else to ask or time runs out.

Demonstrate - You should demonstrate the activity first by eliciting responses from the class.

Props - Props always help, even if it's just a tennis themed photo on the screen or bring in tennis balls (the second one could get a little out of hand, so be careful)

Countdowns​ - Countdowns are always your friend to put a bit of pressure on your students to go when it's their turn. Use this to award points.

Community - The students will eventually learn something new about each other you do this often enough.

Conversation Skills - They will build a better feel for how a smooth conversation works which will help them in their own language.

​What else can you find?

Understanding is number one when it comes to classroom management with teens because that's the most important thing to build a healthy relationship with anybody. Being able to see things from their perspective and understanding WHY they may be doing the things they're doing is the first step toward making a difference in his or her life.

If you've been in a teacher training session or meeting, you know that we do pretty much the same things, in that, if something isn't stimulating to us, our minds can wander, we can joke around with our co-workers, jump on our phones 'for a second', or do any of the dozens of things that our students do that drive us absolutely BONKERS.

I think the word is empathy, and that is the biggest key to reaching and connecting with teens.

There are no cookie-cutter teenagers, just like there is no cookie-cutter you. Once we personalize things, and realize that we are all different, we can better understand that this is especially true of teenagers. As much as they want to be accepted by their peers, and all like the same things, and dress the same way, they also want desperately to find their own way and find out who they are, so they can be that person.

​It's not always easy.

​However, if we do have the opportunity to find out exactly what connects with them, it is very rewarding and makes it all worthwhile.

One of the biggest tools we can use in the classroom is something that most teachers fight against.

Their interests!

If your students are really into Fortnite, instead of telling them to put down the controller and go outside or open a book, let's use that insanity for Fortnite to capture their attention in our lessons. If your students are really into John Cena and saying, "You can't see me", use that in your classes to get their attention and get them talking about, writing about, or watching videos in English with John Cena.

The bottom line is we need to be genuinely interested in the students, find out what they are into, and try to create an environment that makes them want to be involved in our classes by working with what they find interesting.

Even if it's doing something small like using their interest in a PowerPoint presentation or adjust a speaking topic to include that.

Going Deeper - Teaching things that interest them will reach a deeper level than just an English lesson.

Trust - They may end up trusting us in ways that we hadn't anticipated.

​What else can you find?