It’s fallen out of fashion in teaching to refer to something as a “time killer.” I get it. While I don’t recommend killing time for the sake of killing time, sometimes time killers have their uses. It gives students a mental break during the school day (or at the end of the school day). It helps them be more social as they get to know their classmates in a fun way. It can be used as a reward after a test or a quiz. Finally, these games can be used as warm-ups, cool downs, brain breaks, or in some cases, review. 

All of these games can be used for large classes of children, teens, or even fun-loving adults, and they’re organized by the materials needed, so there’s sure to be something you can use even if you don’t have any resources available to you.

If you have a projector

1. Wordle (5-10 minutes)

Because the word changes every day, I’ve had classes in the past that used this puzzle as a warm-up every single day.

Here’s the one from the New York Times which is best used for older classes.

It can also be tweaked to use as a review for an in-class vocabulary word by simply writing your own blank spaces on the board and circling letters in yellow or green based on student guesses. I recommend writing your own “Wordles” on the board for younger students to ensure that the word isn’t too hard.

2. Funny fill-in (10 minutes)

This is basically a digital Mad Libs, and while Mad Libs require printing off before class, this Funny Fill-In can be projected from a computer screen when you suddenly have 10 or so unexpected minutes of downtime in class. Simply choose a story, then let students pick what words they want for their adjectives, colors, nouns, etc. Then read their creation out loud as a class. It’s sure to get lots of laughs and can be a clever way to break up the day.

Play the game here at National Geographic.

3. Countdown (5-15 minutes)

This game is great because you can play multiple rounds. Split students into groups and make sure they have something to write on. Click “random fill” and wait for the letters to appear. Then students write as many words as they can before the timer goes off. The letters that show up are an anagram, meaning that many different words can be made from the letters that show up. Unlike an anagram, you don’t need to use all the letters that show up. Whichever team writes the most correctly spelled words wins. It’s a fast-paced game that gets students working together. It works great with all ages.

Play the game here at Incoherency.

If you have a blackboard (white board)

4. The Bomb/Typhoon Game (20-40 minutes)

This game works great for review. On a piece of paper, make a key that only the teacher will see. This key should be a grid of 5 by 5 with the letters A-E along the side and 1-5 along the top. Then in each box of the grid draw either a question mark, a bomb, a typhoon, poison, or a red cross. Then put a 5 by 5 grid on the blackboard with A-E on the side and 1-5 on the top, but don’t fill in any of the boxes. Leave them blank. Split students into teams (2-4 teams works best). Teams take turns to choose a box on the grid, such as “A2,” and the teacher fills in the box with what was on her key. Here is what each of the symbols mean.

• Question mark = Students must answer a question. They can get a point for a correct answer.
• Bomb = -1 point for your team
• Typhoon = Lose all your points
• Poison = “Kill” someone on another team, so they can no longer answer questions
• Red cross = Revive a “dead” person, and they can talk again

What they see:

What you see:

There are lots of versions of this game, and another one I really like because it’s “ready-to-go” is this one from Teachers Pay Teachers although this one will require a projector.

5. Stop the bus (20-40 minutes)

This game is a classic for ESL teachers for a reason. It’s fun and if you tweak the categories, it can be used for review. It’s also an excellent team building activity for a class that needs to build up their social skills.

Write some categories on the board like animals, food, colors, countries, etc. In small groups, students write those categories on a piece of paper. The teacher says a letter, like “G,” and all teams must fill in each of their categories with a word starting with G, such as…

Whichever team finishes all their categories first yells, “Stop the bus!” and everyone else must stop writing. Award points based on how many answers the teams wrote. 

When I use this game for review, I’ll use categories such as verbs, adjectives, nouns… Anything you can think of will fit into the game.

Some teachers award extra points for “unique” answers, such as if every team wrote “giraffe” for animal and one team wrote “gecko” that team might get two points instead of one but be sure to tell your students this rule before starting.

6. Back to the board (5-15 minutes)

Write some vocabulary words on the board. Split students into teams. Have someone from each team come up and face their back to the board. The teacher circles a word. Their classmates try to get their teammates to guess the word that has been circled. Whoever guesses first gets a point.

This game can be played in different ways, the student who has his/her back to the board can’t see the word that is circled so it’s up to the teams to decide how best to help. They can either try to describe the word without actually saying or spelling the word out or they can try miming the word.

This game can be changed depending on what you need your students to do. If you don’t want to have teams, just have one student come up to do the guessing. If you don’t want the students shouting, have them mime the vocabulary instead.

7. Oscar’s Bingo (30-60 minutes)

Chances are that you’ve played Bingo in your class before, but you haven’t played Oscar’s Bingo.

For this game you need to draw a grid on the board. You can choose to do a five by five or four by four grid. The five by five grid will take significantly longer, so if you’re trying to fill a 60 minute class, choose the bigger grid.

After you’ve put the grid on the board, ask the students to open their books to the current unit, raise their hands, and tell you a word from the unit. Emphasize choosing “harder” words and nothing that’s too easy. As they tell you words, put one word in each square of the grid until the grid is full. This will take 10-20 minutes. Check that students know the definition and how to say the words as you go.

Now have students take out a scrap piece of paper and make a grid on their own paper. Tell them to write all of the words from the board, but don’t put them in the same order as what they see on the board.

Now, play Bingo!

There are two ways to do this.

For lower levels, choose a student at random to come to the front of the room. You can do this using name sticks or whatever you have in your classroom. That student can choose whatever word he wants from the board and cross it out. The other students cross the same word from their paper. This version of Bingo allows the teacher to hear individual students say the vocabulary words and for the teacher to correct pronunciation errors as they come up.

For upper levels, the teacher chooses the word but doesn’t say the word out loud. The teacher should give a clue to the word or say the definition of the word, and let the students guess it and then cross it out. This allows the teacher to check that students understand the meaning of the words.

If you have nothing

8. The rule game (5-15 minutes)

Send one student into the hallway. The other students come up with a “rule” for that student to guess, such as “Girls say yes and boys say no,” or “Only people wearing black t-shirts say yes.” Then the student comes back in. He/She walks around the room asking yes/no questions, such as “Do you like yellow? Are you funny?” or whatever they like. The students must answer based on the rule.

So, for example, if the rule was “Girls say yes and boys say no,” then a student might ask a boy, “Are you a student at this school?” The student must answer no. After enough questions, the student guesses what the rule was. This can be repeated as many times as you or the students want.

9. Fizz Buzz (5 minutes)

Choose a goal number like 40. Students try to count to 40 by going around the room and each student saying a number. However, if the number contains 5 or is a multiple of 5, the student must say Buzz. And if the number contains 7 or is a multiple of 7, the student must say Fizz. 

So, it would go something like this… 1, 2, 3, 4, Buzz, 6, Fizz, 8, 9, Buzz, 11, 12, 13, Fizz…

Start over and try again if anyone makes a mistake. This game is a good warm up.

10. Count to 20 (5 minutes)

Students try to count to 20. Have all students stand up. Tell the students that all they have to do is count to 20 one student at a time. They might think it sounds easy. One student says “1” and sits down. Another says “2” and sits. Keep going. The trick is that students can’t try to count in any particular order or by indicating who should talk next. If two students say a number at the same time, everyone starts over.

What always ends up happening is that students will usually say 1 and 2 without any issues, but as soon as they climb higher, eventually two students will try to say the next number and will end up saying it at the same time. When that happens, they must all stand up and start over.

This is a great brain break or fun way to end a class.

11. Apple Pie (5 minutes)

One student comes to the front of the room and faces his/her back to the class. The teacher silently chooses a student to say, “apple pie.” After that student says, “apple pie,” the student at the front must guess who spoke. Students can be tricky by standing up, moving around, or changing their voice. Allow several students to do the guessing and the speaking. 

This is a funny, silly game to wake a class up or to regain their attention before transitioning to a new activity.

12. What changed? (5-15 minutes)

Send one student out to the hallway.

Together with the students in the room choose something about the room to change. For example, you could open a window, have everyone change backpacks, have someone wearing a hat take it off… whatever your students can think of.

Invite the student outside to come back in. He or she must guess what changed.

Once he or she has guessed the change, choose a new student to send out, and a new thing to change in the classroom.

This can be used to practice many grammatical structures or vocabulary, such as present perfect, “He has just taken off his hat;” past simple, “He took off his hat;” or prepositions, “His hat is on the table.”

It can also just be for a few minutes of fun at the end of a long day.

13. 20 Questions (5-15 minutes)

Almost everyone has played this classic game at some point in their lives. Simply think of something (an animal, a vocabulary word, a vehicle, a place…) and let students ask yes/no questions to determine what thing you are thinking of. Make sure to count their questions. If they ask 20 questions and still don’t know the answer, then the teacher wins.

With lower-level students, it can be helpful to write question starters or examples on the board. For example, Is it a person/animal/place/thing? Can it…? Does it…?

After you’ve played one round with the teacher thinking of something, let a student come up and think of their own object for 20 questions.

14. List 5 (5-15 minutes)

Put students into small groups. Ask them to get out a piece of paper (one paper per group). Get a timer ready. You can use your phone, a computer, a kitchen timer, or just look at the clock in the room. Give students one minute (or less) and tell them to write 5 things as quickly as they can. If they list 5 things that fit the category in time, they can get a point.

Categories can be basic, like “Write 5 fruits/animals/countries.” Or they can be more complicated and fit into a vocabulary unit or specific grammar topic, such as “List 5 things you must do at school.” “Write 5 things you did before you came here today.” “Write 5 things you can find in space.”

The possibilities are endless.

15. Hot Potato (5-10 minutes)

Get a ball, a stuffed animal, or just a crumpled-up piece of paper. Have students sit in a circle (or instruct them how to pass the object around the classroom.) Play some music and let the students pass the “ball.” Occasionally stop the music and whoever has the ball must answer a question.

I play Axel F by Crazy Frog for our classroom games of hot potato and students go crazy for it. Hot potato is simple, but effective!

Want more games? Try 10 Active TEFL Games for Getting Kids Up and Moving or 7 Sentence Structure Games – Make Writing Fun.