This is one of my favourite end-of-course activities for all young learners.
Instructions
You need a piece of A4 paper per student. You can use regular white or colourful photocopying paper.
Write the names of the students on the sheets, one per student, and put them up in the hallway, ideally at a distance from each other. Have a card with your name, too but keep it in the classroom. It will be used for demonstration.
Show your card and tell the students that everyone has a card like that in the hallway. Explain that they are going to walk around and write something for everyone.
If necessary, pre-teach or revise some language, for instance ‘You are…’ and adjectives or ‘Thank you for…’.
Clarify the rules: a) we don’t come up to the card with our name, b) we write something for everyone, c) we can leave anonymous notes or we can write our names, d) we only write nice things, e) if we have nothing nice to write, we only leave a smiley
Give our markers, line up and go out. Monitor and keep an eye on the clock. This part of the task takes about 15 minutes with a group of twelve.
Ask the students to go back into the classroom and quickly collect the letters. Give them out in the final lesson.
Why we love it
- It is a great opportunity for the students to read and to write something that they really care about and it is a great souvenir from the course, handmade and personalised.
- The students have a lot of freedom and can write as much as they want or only leave a smiley in case they really have nothing to say.
- This activity can be adapted to the level and age of the students. It can be done in the classroom, with the papers being passed from student to student, until they make a full circle and return to the owner and the youngest kids can only draw some simple shapes for example a smiley, a heart, a sun, a star and their name.
- The first time I did this activity, I planned for the kids to re-write the letters before handing them out to the addressee but they stopped me (‘But Anka, this is much cooler and more beautiful!!!!”) and they were right!
- I keep my card on the board but I don’t actively encourage the students to write something for me, too. Somehow they always do anyway))
Happy teaching!
I do this in our final staff meeting with teachers. I learnt about it in the final session on the CELTA course I learnt to teach on. Always so uplifting!
Sandy
And now I cannot believe that I have never done it in any of the teacher training courses…Well, there will be another one soon:-) Thank you , Sandy!