Adverbs games and activities
for ESL kids lessons

Games and activities for teaching “Adverbs” to ESL kids

Adverb action

The teacher writes on the board an activity like “brush your teeth.” S/He picks one student and s/he comes to the front of the class. The teacher then shows the student a card with an adverb written on it, such as “slowly”. The chosen student then does the activity in the way of the adverb. The other students have to guess the adverb. The one who guesses right gets a point and mimes the next action which the teacher writes on the board.

To help them you can give them a list of options, if you think they need some help. (Submitted by Libby McArthur)

Adverbs lesson plans

We also have FREE lesson plans on using adverbs which includes games and activities as well as other lesson materials.

Click to download our Adverbs lesson plan and Adverbs of frequency lesson plan.

Adverbs song

We have a song available for download focusing on using the adverbs quickly, slowly, high, low, loudly, quietly, softly, hard.

It is called “Let’s have some fun!“.

Classroom races

Races are a fun way to teach a lot of different action verbs with adverbs. Line the students up and tell them the action they have to do during the race and then shout go. Actions + adverbs include: skip slowly, jump quietly, hop carefully, run backwards, walk quickly and so on.

Meal routines throw

This activity practices adverbs of frequency such as never, rarely, sometimes, usually, often, always.

First, get students to write down as many food words on the board as they can in 3 minutes (if you have a large class, have the students shout out and the teacher writes the words down). Then make 2 teams. In Team A, Student 1 throws a screwed up paper ball at the board. Whatever food word it hits the student must make a sentence using the structure “I _ eat _ for (breakfast, lunch or dinner), e.g. “I sometimes eat chicken for dinner”.

If the student successfully hits a word and makes a good sentence he/she wins a point for his team. If the student misses a word or gets the sentence wrong his/her team misses out on a point.

Train ride game

Have students form a train (standing in line holding onto each other). Choo choo around the classroom and call out instructions (e.g. faster, slower, turn left/right, stop, go).