Vocabulary games
11 fun vocabulary games
to try with your class!
Copyright © 2022 Bedrock Learning Limited. All rights reserved.
Vocabulary games 01
Charades
Time to prepare: Resources:
2 minutes 2 lists of vocabulary (recently studied)
How to play:
Split the class into teams. Each team has
a word list. Players take it in turns to act
out each word for the rest of their team
to guess. Even though you might think
‘photosynthesis’ is impossible to act out,
asking students to do this will really test
their understanding of the term! Give it
a go!
Word harvest
Time to prepare: Resources:
20 minutes but resources can Illustration of a tree on wall or powerpoint,
be reused and/or edited 2 buckets or baskets, note cards of
vocabulary terms.
How to play:
Attach a category label to each bucket, attach terms to tree
(2 categories of equal numbers). For example, you could
have one team looking for words that were in the category
of change (alter, adjust, modify, amend, edit etc) and one
team looking for words that were in the category of keeping
the same (maintain, preserve, retain, prolong etc) or one
team could look for verbs, one for adjectives. Write the newly
learned vocabulary items on the cards and ‘hang’ these on
the tree using blu-tack. Two teams line up by their basket
and take turns to run to the tree and “pick” a word from their
category and return it to their team category. Next student
goes until all appropriate terms are picked. You can have
This works best with more than 2 teams, but just think about how much space
younger students you have at your ‘tree!’
Copyright © 2022 Bedrock Learning Limited. All rights reserved.
Vocabulary games 02
Two of a kind
Time to prepare: Resources:
5 minutes Cards with new vocabulary items on them
How to play: A
A
This game can be played in pairs or groups. Students lay the
cards out face down. They take it in turns to flip over 2 cards. If
they are synonyms, students can keep the pair and continue,
earning themselves 1 point. If not, the opposite team or student
takes their turn. It’s useful for students to explain the meaning of A
each word they turn over before they go for their second card.
Bull’s eye
Time to prepare: Resources:
15 minutes to make cards. These Target on whiteboard or wall, word balls.
can be edited & reused throughout
the year.
How to play:
This one is fun because students get to throw things at the board!
Write your new terms on different pieces of A4 paper. Scrunch
the paper into balls and place in a big pot. Bring the image of
a bullseye up on the board, or draw one on a whiteboard. The
different rings of the bull’s eye represent different challenges
and a different amount of points up for grabs. Students throw
the word ball, teacher notes where it landed on the target,
then the student goes and opens the ball up to see which
new word they are working with. The tasks get progressively
harder as you move towards the centre. So, for example,
if the student throws a word ball and it lands in the outer
ring, they would have to come up with a sentence that
uses that word, if the word ball lands right on the bull’s eye,
they must come up with a definition or description for that
word. You can play this in teams and add up the points as
you go.
Copyright © 2022 Bedrock Learning Limited. All rights reserved.
Vocabulary games 03
Taboo
Time to prepare: Resources:
15 minutes to make cards. Approx. 40 cards for a 10-minute game.
These can be edited &
reused throughout the year.
How to play:
Split the class into 2 teams. Write the new word at the top
of a piece of paper and below write 5 obvious words that
describe your new word. These words are taboo; the students Taboo
cannot use them. The student must describe the new word in
another way. Their team guesses the word. Each time the team
correctly guesses the word, they win the point.
Bingo
Time to prepare: Resources:
5 minutes to prepare the bingo 1 bingo card per student
cards using online generator. Again,
students could make their own with
pen and paper to save you time.
How to play:
Students have a bingo card with 9 new words
on. As you give clues (a mixture of descriptions,
images, metaphors etc.) they cross off the
words on their card and shout bingo as soon
as they have crossed off all their new words!
Vocabulary games 04
Jeopardy
Time to prepare: Resources:
15-20 minutes to prepare questions Question cards or questions on powerpoint
How to play:
You give the answer and the students must buzz in with the
‘correct’ question. You’ve got two options for your answer. You
could say the newly learned word, e.g. “heterogeneous” and the
students would have to say something along the lines of “which
adjective describes something that is different?” OR you could
say “this adjective describes something that is different” for
which the correct question would be “what does heterogeneous
mean?” You can play this in teams and award points for each
correct question.
Categories
Time to prepare: Resources:
10 minutes. Again, get those Create 4-8 lists of 15-20
students to do it for each other words each
if you want to save time!
How to play:
In teams or individually
You give the word lists to the students and ask
them to devise categories of 3+ words.
Points can be awarded for the most categories
generated, or for the most imaginative. Nouns
generally work best, but you can make lists with just
verbs or adjectives. Whilst this seems like a simple
activity, it encourages deep thinking about the
qualities of words.
Copyright © 2022 Bedrock Learning Limited. All rights reserved.
Vocabulary games 05
Opposites attract!
Time to prepare: Resources:
5 minutes Cards and tape
How to play:
Each student is given a card with a new vocabulary item on
it and the student tapes this to their shirt. The students must
find their opposite – the antonym of their word. The teacher
gives the cue to find the other half of the antonym. If you have
a noisy class, this game can be played in silence and within
a time limit! You can award points for the pairs that find each
other first.
Name it!
Time to prepare: Resources:
10 minutes Images depicting vocabulary items
(these can be as literal or as abstract/
metaphorical as you like). 2 mini
whiteboards.
How to play:
Place the images, face down in a container. Divide
the class into 2 teams. One person from each team
comes up, takes a picture, looks at it, and hands it to the
teacher. The student then writes the word or phrase on
their team’s mini whiteboard. If it’s correct, the teacher
gives the OK sign and gives the team a point. The player
then returns to their team and tags the next player.
The team who gets the most points at the end of the
allocated time wins!
Copyright © 2022 Bedrock Learning Limited. All rights reserved.
Vocabulary games 06
Root relay
Time to prepare: Resources:
10 minutes to build bank of roots Card (selection of 3 different colours)
and affixes
How to play:
Split the class into 2 teams. At the
front of the class, place 3 different
groups of cards – roots, prefixes
and suffixes (on different colours
if you want to make it easier). One
member of each team must dash
to the front and collect one card,
then another member must collect
a second card. The teams keep
collecting cards until they have
made a word. The first team to have
made a word wins the points.
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References
Marzano, R. (2013) Scott, Miller & Flinspach (2012)
Copyright © 2022 Bedrock Learning Limited. All rights reserved.
