The key to being able to successfully teach English to nonnative speakers is to teach the language in a lighthearted and entertaining way. When working with children in particular, interactive games and activities are an effective way to teach the language as it keeps the students entertained and more likely to want to engage in learning.

Answers and Questions About People

This activity will encourage students to use their English language skills to ask questions about and describe a character. For this activity, assign a large picture of an interesting but unknown person to each student. Magazine ads with models work best for this. Have the students partner up and instruct them to take turns asking questions about their characters, such as "What kind of music does she like?" or "Does he have any pets?" The other student must then make up answers to describe his person.

Banana, Banana

This activity is great as a review to refresh the students' memories during a lesson. Write all the vocabulary words that the students have recently studied on a white board or chalkboard and have all the students repeat them as you write them down. Send one student out of the classroom and erase one of the words. At the count of three have the class yell out "Banana, banana," signaling for the student outside the class to come back in. Have the student try to guess the word that is missing from the board without help from her peers.

Guess the Theme

This game is effective as it's not only fun but also helps encourage English conversation among students. Divide the students up into two teams. Have one student from one of the teams come up to the front of the class, and give him a piece of paper with seven words on it that are centered around the same theme. For example, the theme could be "body parts" or "food." The student must then describe the theme, without using any words on the paper and only using English, not his native tongue. His team must try to guess as many of the words on the paper as possible. This must be done in two minutes; have the other team keep time. One point is rewarded per word guessed.