Slang is not for everyone. It’s probably not a good idea to teach a lot of colloquialisms at the lowest levels. But with anyone at B2 and upwards you might want to start introducing some phrases. These students usually watch and listen to a lot of native speakers and are bound to come across some slang sooner or later. It’s best if you prepare them for it in advance.
In this post, we have ideas for 8 activities to help you introduce and practise slang in your lessons.
Before you read, check out this post for some tips on how to teach colloquial language.
Role plays
Slang is a spoken language so role plays are a great way to put it into practice. Before the lesson, prepare a few situations in which colloquial language could be used. For example: a phone conversation between friends, a night out, a party.
Divide the students into pairs. Give each pair one situation and the roles to play. At the same time, give each student one colloquial phrase to use in the conversation.
You can get over 100 cards with phrases in Sod it!.
Photo dialogues
Before the lesson, prepare a few photos presenting people talking. Ideally, they should be photos that convey some emotions, for example: people arguing, celebrating, friends talking, etc.
Students work in small groups. Each group gets one photo and a few slang phrases. Their task is to come up with a dialogue between the people in the photo using as many of the phrases as they can.
Brainstorm
This is a great way to introduce some new slang to your students. On the board write a few phrases that you want to teach this lesson. Put the students into small groups or pairs. Their task is to discuss the meaning of these phrases and come up with some definitions.
When all the groups have finished, they share their ideas. While they do it, give them feedback and reveal the correct meaning.
Wrong definitions
Students work in pairs or small groups. Give each group 2 new phrases together with their meaning. Students’ task is to create 3 definitions for each expression. One correct, and two incorrect ones. When they’ve finished, each group presents their expressions and definitions. The others have to guess which ones are true.
Language Quiz
This activity will be a great revision exercise. Students work in two groups. Give each group a few phrases, depending on how long you want the quiz to last. Their task is to prepare quiz questions with these phrases. The questions can be different: correct the mistakes, true or false questions, complete the gaps, etc.
When they have finished, start the quiz. Each group takes a turn to ask their quiz questions and answer the questions from the other group. Give points for each correct answer. Don’t forget to award the winners!
You could also use ready-made quiz questions from Sod it!
Complete it
Each student writes a sentence using a phrase that they have learnt. But they leave blank the space where this phrase should go in the sentence. Next, they pass on their sentence to the student sitting on their right who has to complete it using the correct phrase. You can run one or more rounds of this activity, depending on how much time you’ve got.
Small talk
A great way to practise using slang is small talk. At the beginning of the lesson, even before you ask: How are you?, give each student one phrase. Their task is to use this phrase during the small talk at the beginning of the lesson. As naturally as they can!
Culture and language
Slang is not only a type of language, it’s culture. So whenever you’re planning a cultural lesson about an English-speaking country or area, add some colloquial phrases from this region.
We hope you get inspired for your next slang lesson!
