Expanding an ESL student's vocabulary is vital for developing English skills; however, it would be boring and ineffective to simply teach lists of words. Vocabulary games are a sound way to help students learn new words and how to use those new words in the correct context. These types of games are also useful for filling a spare 5 or 10 minutes at the end of a lesson.

Hangman

The teacher thinks of a word and writes dashes onto a board which correspond to the number of letters in the word. Students then have to call out letters, with too many wrong answers leading to the completion of the gallows. Hangman can be used to teach new vocabulary or revise previously taught words and is a good way to practice spelling; it is also a way for a new teacher to introduce himself by getting students to guess facts about him like his name or home city. The game can be made harder by spelling out phrases or even full sentences rather than single words.

I Went to Town...

The first student says: "I went into town and I bought an ice cream." The next student repeats the first sentence but adds a second item, such as "I went to town and I bought an ice cream and a pie." This continues until everyone in the group has added an item. Students should be encouraged to speak in full sentences. This game is useful for teaching vocabulary; listening skills can be made more challenging by asking students to spell the word they have chosen.

20 Questions

A student thinks of a noun and the rest of the class has 20 questions to guess this noun. Both the student who thinks of the item and the students guessing it should be encouraged to use full sentences, and the student who guesses successfully takes the next turn. Though a very simple game, 20 Questions helps students practice vocabulary and learn how and when to use general and specific questions.

Word Count

This game requires a small amount of preparation: The teacher makes 40 to 50 cards with consonants and 10 to 20 with vowels. The game can be played between individuals or teams. A team asks the "quiz master" (teacher) for nine letters which they can choose from either the vowel or consonant cards. The teams then have a certain amount of time to make as many words as they can from these letters. Points are awarded for every successfully spelled word; for example, a six-letter word scores six points. A word made up of all nine letters scores nine points plus nine bonus points, to give a total of 18 points. The vowel and consonant cards are then shuffled and the next team then gets to choose their letters. The game continues until each team has had at least one go at choosing letters.