Our City (lessons will be added as they are completed):

Introduction:
In this series your students will discover their city (and your city/town) and different types of cars. They will also learn directional commands such as turn right/left. This series consists of 7 lessons. Each lesson is about an hour in length. I have made suggestions as to additional language and sentence structures that could also be taught.

Age: 5/6/7 (depending on student ability)
Level: Beginner

Language Taught:

1. Places in a city: School, river, building, road, hospital, police station, stadium, train station, park, airport, house/home, "my house."
2. Misc: traffic lights, police man, (your students home country) and (your (the teacher) home country and city/town).
3. Directions: go straight, turn right, turn left, stop, and go, fast, slow.
4. Types of cars: jeep, van, taxi, limousine, truck, bus, motorbike.

Sentence structures:

1. Go to the _____
2. How many (Nouns) are there? There are (number) (Nouns).
3. What is it? It's a ......

Activities:

1. Get S's to make cars
2. Directing vehicles to destinations
3. I am I Robot!
4. Draw your own city

Materials Needed:

1. Paper - 1 piece per student for the "draw your city" activity.
2. Crayons, pencils, paper plates (wheels) and decorations - for the "draw your city" and "making their own cars" activities.
3. 4-6 pieces of A4 paper - for the "Directing vehicles to destinations" activity.
4. Flashcards for all the target language

Lesson 1: Our city: part 1.
Vocabulary taught: School, river, building, road and hospital
Go to the (noun). Is introduced here
Phonics

Lesson 2: Our city: part 2.
Vocabulary taught: Police station, stadium, train station, park, airport and house/home
Drawing your own city on paper

Lesson 3: All kinds of cars/ road going vehicles
Vocabulary taught: jeep, van, taxi, limousine, truck, bus, motorbike.
Word recognition and writing.

Lesson 4: Build your own car
Vocabulary taught: Go, stop, slow, traffic lights, and police officer

Lesson 5: Directional commands
Vocab Taught: Go straight, turn right, turn left, fast, slow, go, stop
Sentence structure: “Go to the _____.”

Lesson 6: Review

 Lesson 1: Our city: part 1.
Vocab Taught: School, River, Building, Road, Hospital
Go to the (noun)" s introduced here
Phonics taught: r-o-a-d
Preparation: Flashcards for vocabulary

This is the introduction lesson into the theme of "Our City" and it introduces 5 new words.

1. Warmer - "Switch Seats" - 5 minutes
   
   
2. Introduce and drill the new vocabulary - 15 minutes
   
   
3. Follow-up with a race:
   For the race I used an outdoor playground (any sort of obstacle course will do). Place the vocabulary flashcards at the other end of the obstacle(s). Organise the students into two teams/lines and send off one from each line by saying "Go to the (river)." The first student to get to the (river) is the winner! - 10 - 15 minutes (depending on class size).
   
   
4. Phonics: r-o-a-d 10 - 15 minutes (depending on class size).
   Use TPR action to introduce each letter. Elicit words that start with each letter from the students. Drill phonic value.
   
   
5. Use a fun activity (upside down game, stations, hopscotch, whisper erase) to concrete the phonic values.
   
   
6. Finish the lesson with a fun activity. Check out the idea section for ideas. - 10 minutes

We'll discover more of the city in lesson 2.

Vocab taught: Police station, stadium, train station, park, airport
Drawing your own city on paper
Preparation: a map of your country that shows where your home town/city is located, a mock-up drawing of your home town/city, a map of your student's country that shows where their city/town is and A4 paper - one per student for drawing their city/town.

1. Warmer and review - upside down game to review the vocabulary from lesson one - 5 minutes.
   
   
2. Introduce and drill new vocabulary - 10-15 minutes
   
   
3. Play a fun follow-up game. You could use the "race" game from lesson one, stations or choose a game from the selection at Simply ESL. - 10 minutes
   
   
4. Show the students a map of their country and drill the name (if they don't already know it). Next, show them a picture of your home country (Australia, for example). Drill the name of the country. Go back to their country and point to their city. Elicit the name of it. Switch back to the map of Australia and point to your home town (Sydney, for example) and drill. After that, so the students your drawing of (Sydney) and explain that this is your home town/city. Elicit the different vocabulary from your map (road, river, hospital, etc). Make sure you show them where your house is! - 5 - 10 minutes.
   
   
5. Finally get the students to draw their home city/town on a piece of paper. Make sure they draw their house on the map. - 20 minutes

Additional vocabulary that could be taught:
Use the drawing of your city to teach prepositions - next to, across from, behind, opposite and in front.

In the next lesson we'll take a look at the different types of vehicles. 

Lesson 3: All kinds of cars
Vocab taught: jeep, van, taxi, limousine, truck, bus, motorbike.
Word recognition and writing.
Preparation: Flashcards (2 sets) and paper for students to write on.

Warmer and review - Stations. Use "Go to the (hospital)" - 5 minutes.

Introduce and drill the new vocabulary. Check out Simply ESL's idea's section for drilling techniques. 10/15 mins.

Play a game to re-enforce the written form. Target throwing, duck, duck, goose, upside down game, slap. Check out Simply ESL's idea's section for more ideas. 10 mins.

For this game, it's best to have a large space, either a large classroom or an outdoor area. Teach the sentence structure "Take the (vehicle) and go to (the hospital)."
Place the vehicle flashcards in a pile (2 copies of each flashcard). Place various place flashcards around the room/area.
Demonstrate to the students that they must run and take a vehicle to a certain place. Get the students into lines (I usually have one line for girls and one line for boys). Then say "Take the (vehicle) and go to (the hospital)." The student who brings the correct vehicle to the correct destination is the winner. Get S's to be the teacher. 15/20 mins.

Writing - get the students to write/trace today's vocabulary, if desired. 10 minutes. 

  Lesson 4: Build your own bus
In this lesson, your students will build their own bus (in groups, depending on class size)
Vocab taught. Go, stop, slow, traffic lights, police officer, windscreen wipers, horn, and wheel
"Wheels on the bus" song.
Materials needed: Flashcards, paper plates for wheels, crayons, cardboard boxes.

Warmer - "Wheels on the bus." Teach this song using actions as the song is played. - 5 mins.

Introduce and drill the target language (windscreen wipers, horn, wheel) - 5 minutes

Make a bus! - In groups, get the students to colour their wheels. Then sticky tape the wheels onto the cardboard boxes. Make sure that the students don't put crayon on the back of the wheels because they won't stick to the box. After that, get the students to colour their boxes to look like a bus. - 20 - 30 mins.

Teach go, stop, slow with TPR - 2/3 mins

Teach police officer and traffic lights with flashcards. Explain to the kids that when the light is green, they can go, yellow means slow and red means stop. You can make a game of this:
Elect a student to be a police officer (or the teacher could be the police officer). Someone else displays / operates the traffic lights.
Rules: Green means go, Yellow means that they can move, but they must sit down if the police officer tags them, if the police officer sees anyone move when the light is red, then they must sit down. The last student standing is the winner
You can also dictate what mode of transport they must use (plane, bicycle, car, bus etc)
This activity can last up to 10/15 minutes.

Get the buses that the students made, elect one to be the driver and place the other students in a Congo line behind them. Play the "wheels on the bus&" song and get the S's to act out the actions. This can last up to 10 minutes, depending on how many S's drive the bus.

  Vocab Taught: Go straight, turn right, turn left, fast, slow, go, stop
Sentence structure: "Go to the _____."
Materials needed: Buses from previous lesson, a BIG (at least 2 X 2, if not more) city map on the floor, Flashcards or realia of vehicles and buildings.

In this lesson, your S's will learn all about giving and responding to directional commands.

Warmer: What better way to start the lesson with the S's in their buses and play"wheels on the bus". 5 minutes.

Sit the students down and demonstrate the new vocab with a small number of students (remember to give everyone a go). Drill the new vocab and follow up with either a big Congo line or by using the buses. Let the S's take turns at giving directions. 15-20 mins.

Teach the sentence structure "go to the ___". They should get this quickly. Demonstrate by saying "go to the (hospital)" then go to the hospital.
Drill.
Play a game of stations with the "Go to the _____" structure. 10 mins.

Lay your drawing of a city on the floor. Get S's into two teams, if you haven't already done so. Two S's from each team (4 S's) come forward and play at a time. One student is the "conductor" and has to tell the other student where to go, the other student must listen and direct the vehicle based on the directions.

Give a location to one S from each team (keep it hidden from the rest of the class). It's now a race to see who can get to their destination first! 15 mins

Finish up with a fun game - duck, duck, goose. 10 mins

Well all that's left now is the review. I hope you had as much fun as I did!

 Choose a selection of the S's favourite activities and play them! Look at Simply ESL's idea section for even more ideas.

I hope you had fun!