AAAGH! I’ve Got 5 Minutes Left!

Five-minute Activities for the end of class OR to refresh the energy of the
class if it gets lowwwww:

1. Picture this – Pull out a picture and have students write what they see. Lower
levels can identify people/things and higher levels can describe what people are
doing/might be feeling.

2. Turn-and-talk to neighbor – This can be in the target language to practice the new
information gained in class or it can be done in English (during or at the end of a
lesson) to allow students a chance to check for personal understanding by
teaching the topic/repeating the new concept to a neighbor. You can also use this
as a quick-30-seconds for repetition or double checking or even as an opportunity
to think/pair/share after you’ve asked a question and want them to answer (good
for those “deer-in-the-headlight moments as it allows them to think it out together
and be more comfortable sharing their thoughts to the group)

3. Give students a short dialog to turn and practice with a partner. Have them run
through the dialog a few times and then randomly call on students to run through
the dialog with you when they are finished.

4. Conjugation/Declension relay – Have an envelope/folder/bin of little slips of

paper with charts/room for a verb to be conjugated or a noun to be declined. By
having a generic slip, you can easily grab these, distribute one per team, and then
instruct the students on which verb/conjugation/tense or noun to fill in. Winners
are the first team to correctly conjugate or decline

5. Give students color-coded cards. Ask questions about the lesson and have them
hold up the different colors depending on what answer for which you are looking
(agree/disagree, categorizing, polls...).

6. Ball Toss – Toss a ball around and have students answer a question about the
lesson when they catch it. This can also be an opportunity for a student to ask a
question if he or she needs QUICK clarification about something. This should be
made clear so as to not take up too much time with explanations.

7. Vocabulary pass – In teams, the students should pass one paper back and forth.
Each student may write TWO words (can be a language term and its English
meaning OR two terms in the language OR the English to go with somebody
else’s language terms). Winners are the team that had the most correct/accurate
pairs.

8. Write right now – On an appropriate topic to the lesson, instruct the students to
write their immediate reaction, feelings, etc. in complete sentences (can pertain to
 both the topic and their current assessment of the abilities with the task/topic, etc).
Good to incorporate as an opportunity to write down their thoughts, especially in
schools with week literacy scores (and thus may require additional writing
samples). As students expand knowledge of language, the “write right now” can
be done in the target language. It is important to remember that not everything
needs to be graded or corrected! It is okay to read their work, focusing JUST on
content/cohesion of thoughts (put the red pen down!)

9. Vocabulary drill – Using a set of cards, a list in your head, or the “randomizer,”
have a rapid-fire question/answer session. To add structure, you can require
students to “buzz” in, slap the desk, raise hands, etc and wait to be recognized.
This can be used with vocab or just about anything else!

10. Stick it to me-Give your students sticky notes and have them write on them and
put them on items around your classroom. They can also do this with their school
supplies or clothing .

11. Have students come up to the board and draw vocabulary that you covered that
day. Students who guess first are the next to draw.

12. Students can play a quick game of charades with a partner. Make sure you give
them a set group of words so they don’t waste time trying to think of something to
act out.

13. Guess who?-Choose famous people or places and describe them. See who can
guess who/what you are talking about. Make up your list one day during planning
so you can go right to it and not have to think of someone on the spot.

14. Have students “pass notes” to each other with something they have learned from
the lesson. They should respond to the note, either with a response, a correction
or another example of the same type.

15. Lego building – This will likely take more than five minutes but is a good change
of pace in block classes. Using a set of large Lego blocks, you can easily write
verb or noun stems on the larger pieces and various endings on the smaller pieces
and then have students correctly form words. This also works well with
prepositional phrases (especially in Latin where certain preps take certain cases,
so students can visually assess which nouns can go with which preps).