“So-and-so didn’t come in and didn’t leave sub plans. Can you watch the fourth grade for an hour?”

“The field trip is canceled. Just go play a game with them or something.”

“I hope you don’t mind. They finished the writing test last period, so you can do whatever you want with them now.”

If you’re a teacher, you’ve been there. Whether it’s subbing for an unexpectedly absent colleague or other people’s plans have gotten in the way of yours, sometimes teachers wind up in front of a class with no plan. Occasionally that can be a blessing and you can catch up on a unit you’re behind on or give your students extra time to finish up a project, but if they’ve just had a field trip canceled and are feeling disappointed, they’ve just finished a big test and are unmotivated, or if you don’t know them well enough to know what they need to work on, then these games can be a real life saver.

So read on and keep these games in your back pocket for a painless, plan-free day.

While most of these games are geared towards children, many also work well with teens and fun-loving adults.

1. Stop the Bus

I’ve mentioned this game in another blog post, but it’s a TEFL classic for a reason. However, in its basic form it typically only lasts twenty minutes. Here’s how to stretch Stop the Bus to fill an unexpected hour of class time.

First, put students into teams. (10 minutes)

While you can let students just work with their friends, this can lead to some unfortunate classroom dynamics, including unintentionally leaving some kids out or creating a group that easily dominates the rest of the class. A more interesting way to choose teams is the classic TEFL counting off style. So if you have a class of 20 students, and you want groups of 3-4 students, then you can go around the room counting from 1-6 and pointing at students. Say, “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 1…” for the first 7 students, while pointing at them. But on the eighth student, wait for him or her to say the number 2. Let the rest of the students count off themselves. 

Then point to areas of the room where you want the teams to sit. “Team 1 in the back near the teacher’s desk! Team 2 in the back near the door! Team 3…” Tell all the teams where to sit; then let them move their chairs and desks into groups where you have indicated.

Second, name the teams. (5-10 minutes)

Once all of the students are sitting in their new teams, tell them that it’s time to name their teams. Write 1-6 vertically on the board and give students at least 5 minutes to come up with a unique name for their team. Once everyone has chosen their names, write their team names on the board next to their numbers.

Third, write the categories. (5 minutes)

Now it’s time to write the Stop the Bus categories. Horizontally along the top of the board, write the following categories: Food / Animals / Drink / Boy’s Name / Sports. Of course, you don’t have to use these categories, and can use whichever ones you feel will suit the class, but these are all classic categories that most students, even students’ whose ability levels you don’t know, probably have a wide vocabulary for.

Next, to teach students the general rules of the game, write a letter on the board. A good one to start with is W. Let students help you come up with one word for each category, such as Watermelon / Walrus / Water / Will / Wrestling.

Fourth, teach them to say, “Stop the Bus!” (5 minutes)

Tell them that when they have finished writing a word for each category, they need to yell, “Stop the Bus!” Have everyone practice shouting this and call on an individual from each team to shout this phrase. Remind them if they hear this phrase, they must stop writing.

Fifth, prepare their papers. (5 minutes)

Give everyone a scrap paper or have them get out their notebooks. They need to write the categories on their own pieces of paper. They do not need to write the team names. 

Sixth, now you’re ready to start! (20-30 minutes)

Write a letter on the board and play stop the bus. Between each round, ask students for answers, and write their answers next to their team names on the board. After each answer has been said, add points to the board. Give one point for answers that were said multiple times, and two points for unique answers. For example, everyone said “banana” for B / food, but one team said, “bread,” then that team can have two points and everyone else will get one.

Erase the answers between each round but leave the points so the board doesn’t get too messy.

Finally, add up the points. (10 minutes)

When there are ten minutes left of class time, add up the points. Make a big deal about the winning team. You can all cheer the winners, they can get high-fives, or you can play a silly dance song. Just make a big production out of it without giving any real rewards. (The real reward was playing a game all period.)

Well done! You’ve survived your hour of surprise class time, your students had a blast, and used English the whole time. 

2. Make a Word Search

This “game” is a bit of a time waster, and definitely shouldn’t be used all the time, but it works in a pinch and for students aged 6-11 they always seem to love it.

Give students this “Make Your Own Word Search” grid. If your students are on the younger side, you might want to make a simpler grid for them to fill in.

First, give them parameters for their Word Bank. (5 minutes)

The rules could be, “They must be words from Unit 2,” or “They must be words about cooking.” Also, tell them how many words you want in their word banks, such as, “Everyone must have 10 words in their word banks.” 

Second, give them time to make their word searches. (15-20 minutes)

Now let students choose their words, put them in their word banks, and then write them in their word search. They can go up, down, backwards, diagonally, however your students want. When they finish, they need to fill in the blank spaces with random letters.

Third, let them answer their classmate’s word search. (15 minutes)

When everyone has finished their wordsearch, let them swap papers. Depending on the students’ ages and how well you know them, you might have to facilitate this, so no one is left out. Then give them time to answer their classmate’s word search. 

Fourth, give feedback. (5 minutes)

Talk with students about who made the hardest word search. Whose was easy? Why was his/hers easy/hard?

Fifth, play back to the board or charades. (10-20 minutes)

With however much time you have left in class, play back to the board or charades with words from the students’ word searches to reinforce the meaning behind the vocabulary words.

And that’s all! It’s a simple low-prep activity that includes a bit of spelling and vocabulary practice but is mostly just an effortless way for students to spend an hour having fun while still engaging with their classroom materials.

3. The Hat Game

You need a hat and some slips of paper to play this game which is an excellent one to get students talking and having fun. 

First, brainstorm what to write on the slips of paper. (10 minutes)

Students often don’t have a good idea of what to write for this game, so you can spend 10 minutes brainstorming fun things for your students to guess. 

For older students, celebrities, movies, or TV shows can be good topics. For younger students, animals, sports or toys can be good. Write different categories and ask for suggestions for these categories. Write good examples on the board.

Second, let students write their ideas. (5-10 minutes)

For this game, it’s often fun to let students write whatever they want on the slips of paper, just make sure they know that they’re teammates are going to have to guess what’s on the paper, so it can’t be anything too obscure.

After you’ve finished brainstorming as a class, erase the board, and let students write whatever they want onto the slips of paper, tell them they have to keep their slips of paper secret from their classmates.

You’ll need at least 30-40 pieces of paper to make this a good game, so if you have a small class, then everyone should write 3-4 ideas.

Third, put the papers into the hat and organize teams. (5-10 minutes)

Collect the slips of paper and put them into a hat.

Put the students into teams. I recommend only having 2-4 teams. Organize the teams and let them names themselves if they like, then move everyone so they are sitting with their teammates, but can easily see one another.

Fourth, explain the rules and play round 1. (10 minutes)

In a second, the teacher is going to give the hat to a student. That student must come up and try to explain each piece of paper to his team. If his team guesses the word/phrase correctly, then they can keep the paper. He will have one minute to explain as many pieces of paper as he can. If he can’t explain a piece of paper or if his team can’t guess it, he can put it back in the hat. The amount of papers they have at the end are that teams’ points.

Repeat the process for the next team. One team member will also have one minute to explain and collect as many papers as he or she can.

Make sure the teams know they have to pay attention, even if it’s not their turn because they might get that piece of paper in the future.

Fifth, play the next rounds. (15-20 minutes)

When round one is finished, everyone counts up their slips of paper and puts them back in the hat.

Now it’s time for round 2. In round 2, instead of explaining the slip of paper, a student can only say 2 words to make the others guess the paper. If they are successful, they can keep the paper. Each team will have one minute again.

At the end of round 2, count up the papers, put them back in the hat, and start round 3.

For round 3, a member from each team will have one minute, but they can only say one word to describe what’s on the paper. 

For round 4, someone will have one minute to mime what’s on the paper. They cannot speak at all. They have one minute.

For round 5 (optional), someone will mime what’s on the paper to their teammates, but they will be wearing a tablecloth, blanket, large jacket, or something equally ridiculous to cover their heads and bodies, making their miming difficult to see. They have one minute.

Sixth, declare a winner. (5-10 minutes)

Count up who has the most points and make a big production of the winner. You can also declare secondary winners by asking students, “Who was the best at explaining? Who was the best actor? Who was the worst mimer? etc.)

I hope your students had fun with this modified party game.

4. Write a story and leave out the vocabulary words.

This is a super simple activity that’s a perfect combination of “educational” and fun. Depending on how you choose to do this activity, it can take up to one period or several.

First, go over rules and vocabulary. (5 minutes)

Give students a list of vocabulary words. This list can either be a review list, for example, “any vocabulary word from Unit 2,” or it can be a specific set list of words that you write on the board. 

Optional: If the words are relatively new for the students, make sure to review the definitions with the class before starting the activity. (Add an extra 10-20 minutes)

Then tell students that they need to write a story using these words. I recommend giving students a word and/or sentence limit. For example, one parameter that I often use with 9-11-year-olds is, “Each word must be at least 7 sentences long and you must use at least 10 sentences.”

You can give them a genre as well. For example, my 6th graders wrote scary stories when it was almost Halloween, and we’ve also done competitions to write the “funniest” story.

Second, let them write. (15-20 minutes)

Let students write their stories. They can do this in partners or small groups. I typically let students choose their own groups/partners for this activity. As the teacher, you should walk around the room, correcting grammar and helping with spelling when necessary. Don’t focus too much on grammar and spelling for this activity if it’s just going to be a single class activity. Let students be creative and as the teacher, pay more attention to their use of the vocabulary words, making sure that they’re using the words correctly in the sentences.

Optional: To make this a multi-day activity, give students more time to write, and have them come to you for corrections as they finish. You can collect the papers at the end of class to check them thoroughly, and have students do corrections during the next class. Then you can do the third and fourth steps on a different day.

Third, cross out the vocabulary words. (5 minutes)

Have students draw a single line through their vocabulary words in their stories.

Optional: Let them practice reading their stories out dramatically in their small groups, using actions and clear intonation. Make sure they know that they need to leave “blank” or make a noise for the missing vocabulary words. (Add an extra 10-20 minutes)

Fourth, read their stories out loud. (15-30 minutes)

There are three options for this.

1. Have groups pair off and read their stories to another group. The group that’s reading needs to make a noise or leave a pause for their vocabulary words. The group that’s not reading must guess the vocabulary words from the other team as they hear the stories. This is going to be the fastest option and give students the most talking time. (10-15 minutes)
2. Let a single group come up to the front of the room and read their story, skipping vocabulary words as they go. The rest of the class tries to guess the word either by shouting answers or writing them on a piece of paper and checking with the group afterwards. This will drag the activity out longer and is better for certain classes that aren’t motivated by working in small groups. (20-30 minutes)
3. The teacher collects the stories and reads them out loud to the class. This cuts down on poor pronunciation and allows the teacher to correct grammar mistakes as he or she goes, so the students don’t have to listen to grammatically incorrect sentences. This way is also one of the quickest as the teacher can read faster than most students. The teacher should still skip vocabulary words and let the class guess what word is missing. (15-20 minutes)

Fifth, give feedback. (5-15 minutes)

You can use this feedback time to correct any grammar/pronunciation/spelling errors that you noticed throughout the class. You can also let students vote on who wrote the best/funniest/scariest stories. And finally, you can review any of the more difficult vocabulary words one more time.

This activity is extremely low-prep and I’ve found that most students really love having the time to be creative with their friends. 

5. Oscar’s Bingo

I’ve already explained this game in detail over here, but this is a great game for students young and old. Who doesn’t like Bingo?

Simply choose to make a larger grid and your students will be wondering where the 60-minute class has gone.

Did you like these games? Were they useful in a pinch?

If you want more Oscar Lessons Games, then you should definitely check out these 10 Active TEFL Games for Getting Kids Up and Moving.