49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities - Jackie Bolen 2020

Can and should speaking activity
English conversation games and activities for lower level students

Skills: Speaking/Listening/Writing

Time: 10-20 minutes

Level: Beginner to Low-intermediate

Materials Required: Nothing

There is often a unit in beginner ESL textbooks with "can/can't" for possibility/impossibility and "should/shouldn't" for advice. Here is my fabulously fun way to introduce it, such that even the lowest of the low, quietest of the quiet classes will participate. Tell students that you want to go on vacation somewhere in ... (whatever country you teach in) and need their advice. First, do an example with the whole class and then have students work in pairs using the same script (see below). There are lots of different scenarios to expand the activity.

Teaching Tip:

Use this activity for a variety of contexts. With adult students, use something more interesting like, “How can I find a boyfriend/girlfriend?” If you wish to add a degree of difficulty for intermediate level students, have them explain WHY: “You can go to ... because ...,” or, “You can't go to ... because ... .”

Procedure:

1. Do an example with the class using this script:

A. Where should I go on vacation this summer (winter)? B. You can go to ... .

Elicit some answers. Students in Korea choose the same places all the time and I usually select Jeju Island for reasons you'll see later.

A. Should I go in summer? B. Yes, you should. No you shouldn't. Etc.

A. So what can I do there? B. You can ... .

How can I get there? Can I go by airplane? Can I swim? B. Hahaha! Crazy teacher. No, you can't. You can take a plane or boat!

2. Write the questions and answer sentence starters on the board.

3. Put students in pairs. Student A asks questions and student B gives answers (advice) to their partner using these questions.

4. Students switch roles and do it again.

5. Introduce a new scenario such as a businessman or businesswoman visiting from abroad, or a university student from another part of your country coming to visit your city. One student can pretend to be this person while the other one can give some advice about where to go and what they can do.

6. An optional variation of this is to have students prepare their own scenario (or assign a different one to each group) and a conversation that they will act out in front of the class using can/should for giving advice.