Do you know the bomb game? It is an activity that aims to get learners practicing their prepositions. We tell them that there is a bomb somewhere in the classroom and get them to ask us closed questions in order to locate it (Is it behind the clock, under the rug, in your bag, etc?).

I saw a trainee teacher play this game with her elementary students the other day. It was the second time she had ever given an English class and she did a good job. However, she felt that she had raced through the lesson a bit and as a result, finished earlier than planned.

It occurred to me that the trainee could have made better use of the game instructions. For example, she could have dictated them to her learners:

“We have a problem! There is a bomb somewhere in this classroom. In 2 minutes it will explode. You have to find it by asking me questions. I can only answer yes or no.”

There are many lexical items/grammatical structures contained within these 34 words that could be beneficial to a group of elementary-level learners (including an example of one of the target pieces of language - “in this classroom“.)

The language of instructions is often overlooked as a resource. If we can spend some time during lesson planning to consider how the instructions for a task can be given as clearly, as simply and succinctly as possible, then we may find ourselves with an additional piece of material - a text that can be used for activities in its own right.

For example, a few weeks ago, I uploaded a lesson plan called the Tyrannosaurus rex joke (this can be downloaded from the lesson plans). The activity involves getting your students to draw. Here are the instructions that are offered in the plan:

I want you to draw a picture of a man in the natural history museum. He is pointing to the skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex and speaking to a museum guide. The man is standing on the left and the guide is standing on the right. The T. rex skeleton is in the background, facing left. Draw two speech bubbles - one coming out of the man’s mouth and another coming out of the guide’s mouth.

The language contained in this text could be very useful to a wide range of learners. We could use the instructions for an activity that I like to call a student-to-teacher dictation. Here is how it is done:

1. Tell your learners that you want them to draw a picture.
2. Your learners will take out their pencils or pens.
3. Tell them to put down their pencils and listen first.
4. Give them the drawing instructions above. Talk very clearly, use gesture whenever possible (pointing, outlining the shape of speech bubbles, stepping back to demonstrate the background, etc) and write any new words on the board.
5. Repeat the instructions (twice if necessary).
6. When you are confident that your learners have understood, tell them that you want them to dictate the instructions back to you as accurately as possible. Start them off by writing “I want …” on the board and ask them what came next.
7. Write on the board whatever your students dictate to you. Nominate individuals whenever possible or ask for volunteers to step in when the grammar or language gets difficult. Do not offer any help and write down exactly what your students tell you.
8. Once the instructions have been written in full (complete with mistakes), get your students to turn around so that they cannot see the board.
9. Dictate the instructions back but tidy up/correct the language.
10. Let your students compare what they wrote with each other. Then let them compare the text that you dictated to them with the one that they dictated to you.
11. Let them draw the picture and continue with the rest of the activity.