Here are 10 pre-reading activities to use in class.

Speed chatting

Prepare one or two simple questions related to the topic of the reading. Ask the class to make two rows
facing each other. Then, encourage your learners to ask each other the questions, but warn them that
they only have 60 seconds to do so. Once the 60 seconds are up, one of the rows rotates so each learner
has a new partner. Repeat the process several times.

Discussion

Encourage the learners to have a discussion about the topic of the reading. Prepare four or five
sentences with various opinions relating to the reading. Read them out to the class and then place them
around the room. Encourage the learners to go and stand near the opinion that they agree with the
most. Then encourage that group to prepare reasons for agreeing with that particular sentence. Once
they have done this, the learners can then interact with people from other groups to share their
opinions and reasons.

Brainstorming

Give the class five minutes to brainstorm ideas relating to the topic of the reading. Then give them a
further five minutes to organize their ideas and to form sentences. Once they have completed this,
encourage them to get up and move around the room and share their ideas with other learners.

Pictures

Select three or four pictures that relate to the topic of the reading. Ask the students to make small
groups and give each group a copy of the pictures. The learners should work together to connect the
pictures and to try to guess what the reading will be about. Each group takes it in turns presenting their
ideas.

The title

Ask the students to make small groups and tell the groups the title of the reading. The learners should
work together to pool their knowledge of this topic. Again, once the group has finished, each group can
share their ideas with the other groups.

Story telling

Prepare a short personalized narrative about something related to the topic of the reading. Be creative
with the story. It doesn’t have to be 100% accurate to something that actually happened to you, but it
should be personal, and be told enthusiastically. It will help if there is a little suspense and humour in
the story too.

Short conversations

This time give the students a sentence from the reading. The students then have a conversation with a
partner about the sentence. However, tell them there is one rule. They cannot use more than three
words each time it is their turn to speak.

Pictionary
Select some of the key words from the text. Put the class into two or three groups. In turn, a learner
from each group (at the same time) comes to the whiteboard. They are told the word and they have to
draw that word. They are not allowed to use letters or numbers in their drawing. The other students try
to guess the word and earn points for their team. This can get very lively indeed!

Purpose

Give the students a purpose for completing the reading. This can be in the form of some discussion
questions about the content prepared by the teacher. Give the questions to the students before they
read the text. Ask them to read them and then while they are reading the text, they should prepare
answers to these discussion questions. When they have read the text, they then discuss the questions
with a partner.

Videos

There is so much good free content available these days. First, find a short video relating to the topic of
the reading. I would suggest something around three minutes long. After watching the video yourself,
prepare some simple discussion questions. Play the video and then ask the students to talk with a
partner about what they saw.

What are some Pre-Reading Activities that You can Implement in the Classroom?

There are many pre-reading activities that you can do in the classroom. More than we can even think of

Creativity leads to the creation of more activities to suit needs and interest of a diversed community.

Here are some pre-reading activities that you can implement or modify to meet your student needs.

I hope you like them

#1 Discussion

The first pre-reading activity is about creating a discussion about the topic.
The Teacher prepares 4 sentences expressing opinions about the topic, then sticks them in the 4 corners
of the classroom.

Students go and stand near the opinion they disagree with the most.

The groups explain why the disagree about the topic to the teacher and the rest of the students

#2 I’m listening to You

The second pre-listening task is called I’m listening to you. This activities can help teachers promote
interaction in the class.

This activity requires students to work in pairs. One of them talks while his or her partner listens.

Then challenge them to talk in English for 1 minute about a topic.

Repeat with a new topic, students change roles and they can change partner after they have spoken and
listened to each other.

#3 Quotes

The third activity requires the use of quotes, you can choose quotes from great books.

Good Reads, a very popular site for readers has good lists of questions that you can choose from.
Find a quotation about the topic that you are going to cover and tell students to make groups of three
and discuss the quotes you chose in advance.

Students think about and answer questions like these:

What does it mean?

Do they agree with it? Why/Why not.

#4 Guessing from Words

Before students look at the text they are going to read, the teacher writes 5 or 6 words from the text on
the board and asks the students to guess the topic.

Students brainstorm ideas and then the teacher confirms how close or far they were.

#5 Guessing from Pictures:

The teacher finds 3 pictures or objects which are connected to the story and ask the students to guess
how they are connected.

Students read the text to check if they were right or wrong about the story connections they made.

#6 Pictionary

Select some of the key words from the text.

Put the class into two or three groups. a learner from each group (at the same time) comes to the
whiteboard.

They are told the word and they have to draw that word. They are not allowed to use letters or numbers
in their drawing.

The other students try to guess what the word is and earn points for their team.
#7 Guessing from sentences

The teacher dictates 3 sentences from the passage. Students write them down and check with a friend.

The sentences go on the board if necessary as a final check. Then the teacher asks how these sentences
might be connected. What is the text about?

Students predict then read the text quickly to check their predictions.

#8 How many words do you know?

The teacher prepares the board by writing the letters of the alphabet in 3 or 4 columns.

The students form two lines standing behind each other.

Use 2 colored markers so you know which team wrote what. The first student at the front of each team
gets the board marker.

The teacher gives a topic to the class.

The 2 students move to the board and write one word related to the topic on the board next to the
letter it begins with, then pass the marker to the next students in their team and go to the back of the
queue.

The 2 teams compete to write as many words as possible on the board in 3 minutes.

The team with the largest number of appropriate and correctly spelled answers wins!

#9 Speed chatting

Prepare one or two simple questions related to the topic of the reading.
Ask the class to make two rows facing each other. Then, encourage your learners to ask each other the
questions, but warn them that they only have 60 seconds to do so.

Once the 60 seconds are up, one of the rows rotates so each learner has a new partner. Repeat the
process several times.

#10 Videos

There is so much good free content available these days. First, find a short video relating to the topic of
the reading.

I would suggest something around three minutes long.

After watching the video yourself, prepare some simple discussion questions. Play the video and then
ask the students to talk with a partner about what they watched.

#11 Brainstorming

The teacher gives the title of the reading to the learners and students have to share their all their
knowledge about the topic.

The goal of this activity is help learners create expectations about what they are about to read and then
see if their expectation were met.

For example if you have to teach about the influence of social media on teenagers, students can take
turn and talk about the topic, as they read they can confirm if the study they read confirm their
expectations.

#12 True or False

Let’s take the example of the influence of social media on teenagers again.

You can come to the classroom and read a few statements and ask them if they think those statements
are true or false.
don’t reveal the answers and let them confirm if they were right or wrong when they are doing the
reading.

#13 Introducing Vocabulary

In the context of an ESL Classroom, it will always be important to introduce key vocabulary so students
don’t get discouraged by unknown words while they read.

Introducing vocabulary doesn’t have to be a boring task, you can easily create a wordle with key
vocabulary and see if students can tell you something about those words.

#14 KWL Charts

Have you ever used KWL Charts in the classrooms?

KWL Charts are simple.

Just have students write everything they know about the topic (K column) and everything they want to
know (W column) and what they learned after the reading (L Column)

#15 Quotations

Prepare some quotes related to the topic and ask students to comment on them.

They don’t have to do that as a class, they can make groups of 3 to 5 people and then a member of each
group can share the ideas with other groups.

Conclusion

Remember that the pre-reading stage is the first of three stages, you should learn what types of while-
reading activities you can do in the classroom and also the most common types of a after-reading
strategies.

Pre-Reading Activities
1. “Find The Word” Reading Aloud Activity (Pair Work) 
Put students in pairs and provide them with one copy of a text. Have a secret list of words at
the ready and call them out, at random, one at a time. Allow time for students to scan the text
for the word they hear. The first person in the pair to point correctly at the word in the text gets
a point. Make sure you set sound level rules, as well as clear guidance on how the class should
be silent ready for the next round.
2. “Reading Aloud” Task (Pair Work / Small Group Work)
Provide students with a ‘chunky’ text split into paragraphs. Advise that each student in the
pair/group must read one paragraph aloud. If the person has an issue pronouncing a word,
he/she must circle it and if they come across a word they don’t understand, they must
underline it. Allow students to discuss their problem areas in pairs and then in fours. Go
around making a note of the common issues and write on the board with whole group choral
work and discussion at the end.
3. “Team Reading Aloud” – Pronunciation Reading (Whole Group)
Split the classroom in two and assign all students in each team a number and repeat (using the
same numbers) with the other team. Provide students with a ‘chunky’ text for reading and set
each team off with 20 points. The aim of the activity is to be the team to finish with the most
points after the text has been read. Flip a coin to see which team begins. Randomly choose a
number and that student must begin reading. If the other team spots a pronunciation error, as
the student is reading, a member of the team must put their hand up. If all others in the team
agree, everyone’s hand must go up – this should keep everyone focused. If they spot a genuine
pronunciation error, they can help the reader make the correction receive a point (provide
support if their ‘help’ isn’t quite accurate). However, if the whole team has made a mistake and
picked a word that was correctly pronounced, they will lose a point and the other team will gain
a point. Each time an error in pronunciation is correctly spotted, swap the reading team. Deduct
points for talking or misbehaviour.
4. “The Last Word” Reading Activity (Pair / Small Group Work)
As a group, the team chooses how many words each student should read. For example, 3
words. In addition, allow students to choose the order of reading. Once the students begin
reading, the winner is the student who follows the rules and manages to be the person to read
the last word.
5. “Avoid The Line” – Reading Aloud Activity (Pair / Small Groups)  When you prepare a
text, underline words at random. Students start with 5 points. Each student must read 5 words
at a time, but must avoid actually saying any words that have been underlined. Should they
read the underlined word by accident, they lose a point. Students with with the most points at
the end of the reading activity win.
6. “Bratwurst” Name” – Reading Out Aloud Activity (Small Groups) One student begins
and after a pre-determined number of words or sentences, they shout “Bratwurst / Pain au
chocolat / Churros” (etc, depending on the language you teach) plus the name of someone in
the group i.e. Bratwurst Laura. This person must then continue where the other reader left off.
Award points at the beginning and if someone loses focus and doesn’t know where the
previous reader was, they lose a point.
7. Teacher Names – Reading Activity Out Aloud (Whole Group)
Split the class in two and assign 5 points to each team. Then, model pronunciation of the text
by reading it out aloud. At random intervals, instead of reading the next word, call out a
 student’s name and that student must read the word that their name was replaced by. If the
chosen student doesn’t respond without being prompted within 5 seconds of stopping, the
team loses a point. Perfect for getting students to focus on reading activities, as well as getting
them to pronounce the words you think they might find tricky or could do with knowing. In
addition, you could get students to create a list of vocabulary replaced by students names and
translate/make sentences with, as a post-reading activity.
8. “Wie bitte?” – Reading Aloud Activity (Small Groups)
Put students into threes, taking it in turns to read a sentence. As they read, a student must
make a mistake, on purpose. This could include: wrong words, incorrect genders, wrong
pronunciation, incorrect verb ending etc. When a listener hears a mistake, they must say ‘Wie
bitte?’ ‘oh la la’ or ‘Oye’, depending on the language you teach. If they can correct the mistake,
they win a point and if they can’t correct the error, the reader gets a point. This can also be
done as a whole group with students standing up when you make a mistake. The last one to
stand up is ‘out’. However, make sure you give students who are out a little task to do until the
end of the game.
9. Spontaneous Reading Activity (Whole Group)
One student starts reading at random and can read a maximum of one sentence. As soon as
they end their sentence, another student must begin reading. If no-one starts within a second,
or more than one person starts reading, the whole group must go back to the beginning.
Starting with another student reading the first sentence. You can vary this by getting learners to
translate the text as they read the sentence or change the person (thus the verbs and
possessive adjectives etc). Keep going back to the beginning until the reading out aloud activity
has been completed as per the rules.
10. Find …. – Skim Reading Activity (Alone)
As soon as you give students a reading text, provide them with a list of words in L1 (native
language) to find in L2 (language being learnt) in the text. This could be all masculine nouns, all
verbs, all adjectives, all words beginning with ‘a’. They could either highlight the words in the
text or underline the words.
11. Find the Synonym – Skim Reading Activity (Individual)
As with reading activity 10, give students a reading text and provide them with a list of words in
L2. They must find and note down the synonyms they find in the text.
12. Be A Presenter – Reading Aloud (Pairs)
Have iPads or laptops available, enough for one between two. Have students paste a copy of
your text into cue prompter with one student sitting with their back to the laptop and the other
person reading aloud. The presenter must read clearly with accurate pronunciation and the
listener must fill in the gaps on their sheet as they are listening with the words they hear. They
may not ask the presenter to spell any word. Instead, if they have gaps at the end, the
presenter must re-read (the whole lot or just the sentence, depending on how you’re feeling on
the day).
13. Guess The Rule Reading Aloud (Whole Group Game)
The teacher begins by reading every other word from the text in order. Students must put their
hands up to guess the rule. Allow individual students in the group to do the same by reading
aloud. The rest of the group must try to guess the rule. Students can only start to put their
hands up after the reader has read at least 1/3 or 1/2 of the text. Let the students be creative
with their rules. The teacher could also re-read and do the same with adjectives, nouns, verbs
 etc to make the reading activity more grammar based. It’s perfect to get reluctant and shy
students reading.
14. Running Dictation Speaking Reading Activity (Small Groups)
This works better with shorter texts or splitting a whole text into paragraphs, which each team
is responsible for. Put enough copies of the texts up outside the classroom with a number on
each. Assign each team a number. Advise the aim is for students to be the first team to
communicate the text from their corresponding paragraph outside the classroom, without
cheating. Students must take it in turns to read a sentence in sequence from their paragraph,
and be the first team to finish communicating and writing the paragraph down on a sheet of
paper. 
RULES: a) only one student can be out of their seat at a time, b) students must not run or shout,
c) students  must also take it in turns to write the sentences on the paper, d) learners are not
allowed to spell any words, but they are allowed to go back as many times as they need to to
re-read the sentence, e) the rest of the group must work as a team to ensure the words are
spelled accurately and the grammar is also correct.
15. Gap-Fill Transcript Dictation Reading Activity (Individual)
Provide students with a copy of the text, with gaps. I suggest three forms, one with verbs
missing, the second with nouns missing and the third with adjectives missing. Distribute the
sheets so they have people around them who had the same sheet. The students must
individually fill in the words as they listen. You could read again if necessary. Once finished, get
learners to check they have spelled the words correctly by discussing (not showing!) with their
neighbours.
16. Wrong Words Reading Activity (Individual)
The teacher provides students with a copy of the text with a selection of incorrect words. As
they listen to the text being read, they must highlight the word they hear that is incorrect. Go
through a second time, and this time, the students must write in the correct words. This will
give the students an idea of the text before they do any comprehension activities.
17. Key Word Bingo – Vocabulary Based Reading Activity (Individual)
From the text, read 5-20 words (dependent on text length) at random in L2. Students must
cross them off as they hear them.

Post-Reading Activities
1. True or False? – Post-Reading Activity (Alone)
Once students have read the text through properly, allow them 5 minutes to create a list of true
or false statements. These can be given to a peer to answer if time allows.
2. Summarise The Text – Post Reading Activity (Individual)
Once students have read the text, advise that they must underline the key messages,
depending on the size of the text. I recommend advising a maximum number. Students must
then combine and re-word these ideas to summarise the whole text in a set number of words.
3. Re-write The Text – Reading Activity (Alone)
After reading (and depending on the length of the whole text), students must re-write the text
in the first, second or third person singular. If the text is long, then advise that they should pick
out a certain number of paragraphs.
4. Walking Text – Reading Comprehension Activity (Individual)
Instead of getting students to read the texts in their seats, print out a few copies.  Ensure the
text is enlarged and in paragraphs with line numbers. Then, chop them up with numbers,
indicating the paragraph number on each and stick them around the room. I recommend doing
a few copies to ensure that no more than 2 students are at one paragraph of text at a time.
Give them some pre-printed comprehension questions to answer as they go around. You can
support learners who need it with an indication of the paragraph number, correlating to the
question, written on their sheet