Page in JapaneseESL, EFL English language teaching site for teachers of elementary and primary school children. Free ESL MP3 songs, free ESL games and teacher training in Japanese

Shapes!

Target Language: Shapes
Target Grade: Kindergarten to Elem 5


This song is in the Teacher's Set
And in the new curriculum Level.


(Thanks to Frank in China for the video!)


Owners Club
Bonus Materials...


A4 Flashcards
(What's this?)






Mini Cards
(What's this?)






Dice Game
(What's this?)






Dominoes
(What's this?)


Islands Game
(What's this?)






Snakes & Ladders
(What's this?)



Spaghetti Game
(What's this?)



One Card Game
(What's this?)



Cut out stickers


Owners Club Members can click on the pictures above to print them out


Shapes!
===============
by Richard Graham

Triangle (Triangle)
Circle (Circle)
Diamond (Diamond)
Oval (Oval)

Shapes, Shapes,
Lots & lots of shapes

Rectangle (Rectangle)
Heart (Heart)
Square (Square)
Star (Star)


Shapes, Shapes,
Lots & lots of shapes

This is one of those themes that kids can sometimes find a little boring, but not with this song!

WARNING: It will stick in your head all day!


How to teach ....


The actions are simple, just mime each shape as you sing it.

The words are introduced in a specific order to make it easier to teach some of the more complicated shapes really easily. The rhymes also help a lot.

Top 5 Classroom Shapes Games

I put a shout out over on the blog the other day for everyone's favourite shapes games. Here are the top 5!

1. Hamsters make a circle!

1. Get the kids into two or more groups.
2 Give the groups funky names ( e.g. animals for younger kids).
3. Then you say "Cats, make a circle" "Hamsters make a circle".
4. Each team makes a circle and join hands.
5. Then you can say other things like "Hamsters, make a triangle. Cats, make a square" and see which team does it the quickest!
6. Repeat from 5.

2. Rope Game

Give the kids pieces of string (or rope). Say a shape and they have to make it with the rope! (From Sonja)

3. What's missing?


(Can you see which one is missing ?)

1. Show all the flashcards (see the box above right!)
2. The kids close their eyes.
3. You take one away.
4. The kids have to guess which one you took away.
5. Keep going till they are all gone!
(From Kristin)



4. Monsters & Robots


Use the Let's make a monster song but this time add in shapes as well as colours and body parts. e.g. This monster has 7 green triangles for arms or This robot has 3 purple diamonds for eyes. (From Nena)


5. Kaboum!


Put the minicards in a bag. Choose of the shapes to be the "kaboum" card. One child comes and picks a card and says the English, getting 1 point. But if it is the "Kaboum!" card everyone shouts out "Kaboum!!!" in a big voice. ( from Nathalie)

6. Bonus: What's on the Christmas tree?

Get some pictures of Christmas trees from magazines or google images. The kids try and find out what shapes they can see. If they've already done the Under the sea lesson they can say things like "I can see a triangle!", "I can see a purple star" etc. etc.




Enjoy!




Readers Comments:

  • Kristin

    Catchy tune! I am sure my kindergartens will love this one!

    For games with shapes I have done the gMissing Cardh. After teaching all the shapes, and the kids know them pretty well,the cards are places on the floor in front of them. They all have to close their eyes, while I remove one of the card and mix the others around. They then open their eyes and try to find out which card is missing. When they get good at this, I remove 2 cards, then 3. My kindergarteners really like this game.

  • Nena

    Great song!
    Ifve taught shapes (square, circle, rectangle, and triangle) mixing them with feeling (happy, sad, angry and hungry) and obviously colors.
    I draw people or monsters and the body has the shapecso theyfre called
    Mr. Square (red, angry) Mr circle( yellow, happy) etc. Sometimes I invent stories with themc.The kid love it!
    Have a nice day!
    Nena

  • Martin

    Richard, youfve ruined my day. I canft get that bloody tune out of my mind. I will have to see a hypnotherapist.

  • Carol

    Cute song. I agree with Nena about using shapes and colors to make monsters. Another idea is to have students look at monsters drawn in black and white and have the kids color: the triangle is red (and combine with body parts, the red triangle is the nose)c

    super Richardc.

  • Lines

    Itfs great as everything you do Richard.
    I usually give each child one oreo biscuit (itfs round) and three glacasitosh, they are round too. So they make a face ( the lacasitos are the eyes and mouth) and I say itfs round like a circle. If they know the word gcircleh and they can recognize the circles, they can eat it or some of them want to take it at home.(everyone learn it, because they love these biscuits too much)
    The square is like a sandwich and the triangle is like the half of a sandwich with chocolate cream on it.They spread the chocolate cream on it repeating the word square, then they cut it out doing the same.
    we make a train with rectangles (red,bluec)for the wagons and circles for the wheels.I give each child a rectangle and each one place glue it to male the train.
    I take pictures of them and I make squares and they glue their pictures on his/her wagon.We do feedback with the train.
    Thank you for all the Halloween materials you give us.

    (In Halloween I used the oreo biscuits for making spiders too).They loved it a lot. Itfs not expensive.

  • Nathalie

    For teaching shapes, you can do sooo many games. I made two groups and had them sing the hide and seek song. One half of the class counted to ten (numbers), the others hid a shape each in the classroom. Then the first group got 20 seconds to find all the shapes and name them.
    I also did dancing chairs, and they have to name the shape that is under the chair before they can sit down.
    You should also try KABOUM: put all the shapes in a bag, decide on a shape that is the bomb (for instance: the circle). Then a child takes out a shape. If itfs the circle, everybody says KABOUM!! You put the circle back in and continue. The little ones love this!





    Sign up to get my top tips, games & hints via email!


    Copyright (C) 1999/2023 by Richard Graham www.GenkiEnglish.com
    Main Menu -|- Buy the Set -|- Contact Me