If you’re not following a set curriculum ( e.g. mine is here)  then it can sometimes be a bit tricky to get the kids as super enthused after Christmas.

Luckily every four years, and this year, we have the Winter Olympics coming around which gives us some great opportunities for extra genkiness in class!

So first of all for your main theme then definitely check out the Winter Sports song,  the kids love this and it gives you a chance to teach lots of cool winter words.

Ninja Tip:  This song has both US ( sledding) and UK ( sledging) versions.

You can check out the games for this lesson on the Lesson Plan page.

Winter Olympics Medal Game:

One great game I’ve used for the Olympics (Summer or Winter)  is to print out, or put on screen, the medals table in English from the Winter Olympics websites.

Then you can play a game ….

1. Bring up the current medals table on the board.

2. Ask a question, such as “How many medals does Finland have?”

3. The quickest team to answer is the winner.

4. Draw up a new medals table for the class on the board, and give this group a gold medal.

5. They then asks another question for another team to get the silver medal.

Great for numbers, countries & phonics practice for countries they don’t know!

Ninja Tip  You can also use Google Earth to zoom in and ask “Where is ….?” with place names or even event locations.  Or  you can use the medalists table to ask questions like “Which country is ….. from?”

The Ski Game

And my favourite review game for this time of year is the Ski Game. 

As Erica wrote in the comments:

This game works well in your classes that like to chat because the teacher can move the team’s skier back to the start line whenever he/she hears that team talking.

Enjoy!