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Author Topic: 20 Questions Lesson  (Read 3439 times)

Offline larsbac

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20 Questions Lesson
« on: April 19, 2011, 09:35:43 am »
If you're looking for a lesson that requires virtually no preparation but has the students engaged the entire class, you should try this 20 questions lesson.

1) Go over what a YES/NO QUESTION is. I explained that there are five general types:
    "Do you..."
    "Is your (it)..."
    "Have you ever..."
    "Can you..."
    "Are you..."

With each of these I give lots of examples. Do you like kimchi? Is it raining outside? Have you ever been to a foreign country? Can you play a musical instrument? Are you an only child?

I also call on individuals in the class. I ask students a question with one of these question types. Its fun if you make them personal/silly. For example, "Are you handsome?" or "Do you like Girls Generation?" (I teach at an all-boys high school so these usually go over well). To get them speaking a little more do follow up questions like "Which girl in Girls Generation is your favorite?" etc.

2) Tell students you will now give them the ANSWERS and they must formulate the QUESTION. Examples are:
    Yes. I like soccer. (Do you like soccer?)
    No. I am not going to China next year. (Are you going to China?)
    Yes. I want to be Pikachu. (Do you want to be Pikachu?)

3) Explain the 20 questions game (at least one student always knows it). Explain that the person in the front thinks of something (anything they want) and then everybody else has to ask only YES/NO questions to try and guess what the thing is. I usually go first so that they understand how to play. With higher level classes I pick something hard (once I did The Pyramids in Egypt and they actually guessed it...) and with lower level you can make it something easier (usually something in the classroom).  After one round, start picking students to come up and be the thinker.

No one falls asleep during this class and its a good review for most students. Good luck!
   


« Last Edit: April 19, 2011, 09:39:46 am by larsbac »
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Offline odie

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #1 on: April 19, 2011, 09:43:29 am »
Great filler for my after-school classes. Thanks!
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Offline thektulu7

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #2 on: April 28, 2011, 03:05:41 pm »
I like this lesson. Or at least I HOPE I like it. I'm going to try it out soon. I thought I'd try it tomorrow, but suddenly my classes were canceled to allow the students time to prepare for the mid-terms.

Anyway, I'm going to use this as a good excuse to review the difference between yes/no and 네/아니오. We'll see how that goes!
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Offline darkling_i_listen

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #3 on: May 29, 2011, 11:07:25 pm »
Have you found that this can stretch for 50 minutes? I'm wondering if I should do it for an entire class period or if it'll just be a fun coda.
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Offline YourFriendBen

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #4 on: May 30, 2011, 12:43:36 am »
Thanks for sharing and reminding me of this game man. This should work well with some of my daily classes as well with my after school class.

For the question about it lasting for a 50 min, maybe it could. This should help with adding some entertainment at the tail end of the class, if need be.

http://www.20q.net/

It has multiple language support too, if the students want to see if they can outsmart the computer in Korean as well. You'll have to work in a way that it teaches English though, if you want to be proper.
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Offline tazzibear

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #5 on: May 30, 2011, 02:04:37 pm »
could you give me some ideas for topics~iv got low level high schoolers!
this is a great idea by the way  :)
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Offline kaymac

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #6 on: May 30, 2011, 04:00:14 pm »
I have played this where I put them in teams. I usually tell them it has to be a person, place, or thing (so they don't just think of a random word in their vocabulary). I did it with an extra class and I made them into teams. The team that guessed got a point. People on teams had to take turns asking questions, etc. It was fun, the kids got into it. I made them write down their word first so they couldn't cheat and so I could make sure the students answered the "yes/no" questions correctly.
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Offline wdubya

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #7 on: May 31, 2011, 09:28:16 am »
very good for my highschool boys as questions were very difficult to get any more detail on their answers
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Offline joel

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #8 on: June 02, 2011, 01:11:36 pm »
For some reason http://www.20q.net/ is blocked by my school? I'm always surprised by the things i'm allowed to look at and the things I'm not!
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Offline ameliamarie

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #9 on: June 07, 2011, 08:13:50 pm »
I've played this countless times with my classes and it literally never fails.
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Offline dbtm

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #10 on: June 08, 2011, 08:49:59 am »
this idea is so great i cant believe i never thought of it before................
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Offline larsbac

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #11 on: June 08, 2011, 01:42:41 pm »
Sorry for being so MIA on this thread! But to answer the question about it lasting 50 minutes...YES its definitely possible. I've used it as a full lesson. Usually I can make it last the entire time by:

-When explaining the five different kinds of yes/no questions, call on individual students and ask them a question using that form to reinforce the idea. Also, if you do silly ones then a tangential conversation comes out of it, but they're still using English so I don't mind the tangents so much!

If you're brave, you can turn the tables around and tell them that they can ask you any question that has a yes/no answer. This gets them speaking/asking questions but it might invade your privacy though, haha.

With lower level students tell them that they have to pick an item in the classroom so that usually makes the guessing a lot easier and the game go quicker. For my higher level students I did something abstract or really difficult like "The Pyramids of Egypt" (which they actually guessed!) or "Pi" They get a real kick out of it though. Hope that helps!
« Last Edit: June 08, 2011, 01:45:09 pm by larsbac »
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Offline cassie

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #12 on: June 08, 2011, 02:51:31 pm »
I've played this with my classes before and they love it.

If you want, you can give the answering student a picture to work with. It's always hard to come up with enough people/things, so here's what I used for a game once. It lasted about 30 minutes. This might at least get some people started who want to use it for a whole lesson.

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Offline annekat

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #13 on: June 08, 2011, 03:24:17 pm »
I love playing this game.
I have found that animals make a really great topic for elementary and middle school kids.

Question clues I usually give:

"Is it bigger than a dog?"
"Can it fly?"
"Does it have 4 legs?"

We actually played it today and one student said "is it cuter than mouse?" which I thought was pretty cute.
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Offline clarkent

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #14 on: June 10, 2011, 10:01:14 am »
Thank you for this. Classes that don't use powerpoint are usually the best. I will try it out on Monday, and I am sure that it will work.  :laugh:
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Offline matthews_world

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #15 on: June 10, 2011, 10:26:16 am »
I did a variation on this with my after school 5th graders in conjunction with Lesson 7 which talks about describing people.

There next task was to choose a famous celebrity, foreigner or Korean, and describe them.  In the next class, they'll create a poster with pics or drawings of their favorite celebrity complete with the descriptive sentences they've composed.
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Offline gksdfma0925

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #16 on: June 13, 2011, 03:43:16 pm »
I am sure it will work!!!!! :D
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Offline elzoog

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #17 on: June 14, 2011, 03:13:47 pm »
Another useful yes/no question to add to the list is

"Does it have something to do with ...?"
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Offline thaivle

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #18 on: July 03, 2011, 04:58:06 pm »
Most of my students enjoyed this game, but some of them showed no interest. Those students felt the game was too easy. To make it more interesting for them, I had them teach part of it to the class. It got them interested in the lesson too!
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Offline elzoog

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Re: 20 Questions Lesson
« Reply #19 on: July 03, 2011, 10:35:43 pm »
Quote from: thaivle on July 03, 2011, 04:58:06 pm
Most of my students enjoyed this game, but some of them showed no interest. Those students felt the game was too easy. To make it more interesting for them, I had them teach part of it to the class. It got them interested in the lesson too!

It's not easy if they have to do it in English.   You can add fairly difficult questions like

"Does it have something to do with ~~~?"

"Is it related to ~~~?"

I usually tell students if they think it's easy, then they should have no trouble doing it.   If they then have trouble doing it, I can then say, "See, it wasn't as easy as you thought!"
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