Matching games

Matching words with pictures is a useful way of presenting new vocabulary to young learners, and is equally valuable as a technique for reviewing words that have already been learned. This is particularly suited to lexical sets such as animals.

One way of doing this is to have all the words up on the board - preferably on flash cards as this is a lot quicker than having to write them. As the teacher says and points to each word, learners take the corresponding picture from the selection on the table and stick that on the board. This can be done as a competition, with students racing to grab the correct picture and scoring points for doing so. The pictures can then be matched up with the words on the board, or stuck in a separate section.

Alternatively, a less competitive version of the activity would be for the teacher to give each word to one student to match with the correct picture, going around the class in turn. In either case, this activity reinforces the spelling and the pronunciation of the word, and the association of the word with the picture. 

Using pictures is a simple way to avoid translation when working with young learners, so they get into the habit of associating the English word directly with the object.