Months of the year lesson plan

Stand-alone lesson ESL kids lesson plan

Lesson plans for ESL kids teachers

Months of the year

In this lesson students practice saying the months of the year. Students put months into the correct order, play fun games and activities, sing and march to a song, read a funny story and do a months writing worksheet.

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Time: 40 mins – 1 hour
Objectives: Saying the months of the year.
Structures: “What month is it?”.
Target vocabulary: January – December.

Lesson materials

Printables:

Months order worksheet
Months scramble worksheet
Reader worksheet
Months march song poster

Songs:

Months march

Readers:

Silly Willy’s months

Additional materials:

Months of the year vocab crossword
Months of the year vocab word search
Months of the year worksheet

Supplies:

[hide_on_uk]colored[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]coloured[/hide_on_us] crayons/pencils
a calendar (in English if possible)
sets of 12 cards with a month written on each card (enough sets for each pair of students)
Blu-Tack or tape
board with marker / chalk
device to play the song on

Notes:

Learning all the months in their correct order is not the easiest task, but using the song in this lesson regularly helps a lot!

Lesson procedure:

Warm up and maintenance:

The beginning of your lesson is extremely important: this is where you set the tone of your lesson and get everyone in the right frame of mind for learning English. It is also an opportunity to check homework and review previous lessons.

Click for warm up suggestions for the start of your lessons

Print this warm up and maintenance section

These activities can be done in the following order at the start of your lesson:

1. Greetings and name tags
Greet the students by name as they enter the classroom and gesture for them to sit down. Before class prepare some blank name tags (stickers or pin-on tags). Give these out and have everyone write their names and put their tags on. If you use pin-on tags, you can keep and give out every class.

2. Homework check
Check each student’s homework set in the last lesson. Ask each student some questions about their homework worksheet (e.g. “what [hide_on_uk]color[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]colour[/hide_on_us] is it?”), give lots of praise, and then put some kind of mark on the homework sheet (e.g. a sticker, a stamp or draw a smiley face). Finally, tell your students to put their homework back into their bags.

3. Review past lessons
Reviewing past lessons is very important – students need constant practice of new vocab, structures, songs, games and so on. Always review parts of your last lesson as well as some parts from other previous lessons. You can spend 5-10 minutes reviewing – it’s fine to recycle games and activities from your past lessons to review as kids enjoy playing familiar games (although be careful not to play a game to death!). See the section “Other ideas to include in your warm” below for ideas.

Note:

You can also include review activities in the main body of your lesson. Kids can have short attention spans so it’s good to be able to pull out lots of activities during different stages of the lesson.

Other ideas to include in your warm up:

Ball pass questions
This is good to review questions from previous lessons. Get everybody standing in a circle.

Round 1:
Take a ball and hold it and say, “My name is (you name)”. Then throw the ball to one student and say, “What’s your name?”. Students throw the ball around randomly, saying their names and asking for names.

Round 2:
This time ask a review question, e.g. “How many tables are there?”. Then throw the ball to a student who should answer, “There are (6) tables”. Help if necessary. Then that student throws the ball to another student and asks a “How many …?” question. Continue so everyone has a go. You can have multiple rounds with different topic questions.

Play “Spin the bottle”
Sit students in a circle with a bottle in the middle. Teacher spins the bottle. When it stops spinning the student it is pointing to has to answer a question. If the answer is correct then that student can spin the bottle. This is a good class warm up activity (e.g. How are you? What’s your [hide_on_uk]favorite[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]favourite[/hide_on_us] food? How’s the weather today?, etc.

Play “Vocabulary basketball”
This is a fun game which reviews vocabulary from previous lessons. You will need a basket (a trash can) and 2 balls (or 2 pieces of A4 paper scrunched up into balls).

Form 2 teams and line them up so that two players from each team are facing the front with the basket in front of them. Let both players throw their ball – if they get their ball into the basket they can try and win a point by giving the correct answer to a question the teacher asks. This can be an actual question (e.g. What are you wearing?) or a flashcard (What’s this?). Then they go to the back of the line. At the end, the team with the most points is the winner!

Play “What’s missing?”
This is a fun review memory game – students will have to try to remember review objects from previous lessons (e.g. classroom stationery). Lay the objects out on a table for all to see. Allow the students a minute to memorize the positions of the objects. Remove an object and hold it behind your back. Say, “Open your eyes!” – the first student who can shout out the missing object wins a point for his/her team. Play for all the objects.

Finally, calculate which team has won the most points and give them a round of applause.

Play “Quiz game show”
This is a fun quiz game, like a simple version of a TV game show. Draw some circles on the board and randomly write numbers 1, 2 or 3 in each circle. These will be points.

Put students into teams. Then ask the first team to choose a number – 1 is an easy question (e.g. “Do you like bananas?”) and 3 is a difficult question (e.g. point at a clock and ask, “What time is it?”). 2 will be in between in terms of difficulty. When the question has been answered correctly, erase that number circle. Play until all the number circles are gone – the team with the most points is the winner!

Read a classroom reader again
As you progress through the lessons you will start to build up a catalog of classroom readers (see our Readers download page at https://www.eslkidstuff.com). Kids love going back to old stories and reading through them again. Invite a student to pick a classroom reader and read through it as a class. Make the story as interactive as possible by asking questions (e.g. what [hide_on_uk]colors[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]colours[/hide_on_us] there are, the names of different objects, etc.) and getting students to speculate what is going to happen next in the story.

Talk about the weather (do after you have taught the weather lesson plan).

Prepare a weather board. Before the first class prepare a piece of cardboard and cover it with felt – you are going to pin this to the wall. If you can, try and get blue felt (to represent the sky). Write at the top in large letters, “How’s the weather today?”. Below that write “Today it’s”. Cut out weather pictures (such as our weather flashcards) and stick some velcro on the back. Arrange the weather pictures around the edge of the board and then put the board on the wall of your classroom. You can now use this weather board at the beginning of every lesson.
Ask about the weather. Ask, “How’s the weather today?” and have students put up their hands. Allow one weather condition per student (e.g. “It’s rainy”) and have each student come up and put a weather picture on the weather board.
Introduce more weather vocabulary. Depending on weather conditions, you can introduce more weather words (with pictures … you can get students to draw them), such as:

stormy
misty
showery

freezing
humid
frosty

icy
drizzly

New learning and practice:

Use a calendar to teach the months of the year

1.Teach the months of the year vocabulary
Start off by looking at a calendar with everyone (an English one, if possible). Have some fun with the calendar first: ask students to point at holidays such as Christmas and to point out their birthdays. Ask what month their birthdays are in and point to the month word (e.g. January) at the top of each month. Start to teach / elicit the English words for months as you discuss their birthdays. Ask what month it is now as well as the following (using the calendar):

the month Christmas is in
months other holidays are in (e.g. Easter, famous national holidays – this depends on the country you are teaching in)
months for different seasons (e.g. summer months, winter, spring and fall / autumn)

2. Play “Put the months in order”
Before class, prepare some [hide_on_uk]colored[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]coloured[/hide_on_us] rectangles of card and write the months of the year in thick marker pen on each rectangle of card. You’ll be putting students in pairs so make enough sets for each pair. Also, if each month can be written on a different colored card it will help the students to quickly identify each month.

In class, put your students in pairs and give each pair a set of mixed up cards. By referring to the calendar, have the pairs put the months in order on the floor or table. Then get everyone to touch each card and repeat after you as you chorus the months of the year paying special attention to the fist letter of each word (e.g. “J” for “January”). Run through a few times, getting faster and faster.

Finally, get the pairs to mix up the cards and tell them they are going to race to see which pair can put their cards in order first. Say, “Ready, steady, go!” and let the students put the cards in order.

3. Play “Wall touch”
Give each pair some Blue-Tak or something to stick the cards on the wall with. Ask everyone to randomly stick their cards all over the walls around the room. Then bring everyone into the middle of the room. Shout out, “January!” and everyone has to race over to a January card and touch it. Then “February!” and so on (in the correct order) until you make it through all the months. Play another round, this time faster.

4. Sing the “Months march” song
Put one set of months cards on the board in the correct order (or use our song poster). Get everyone to stand to attention, like soldiers, and then follow the steps in the Gestures section below. If this is the first time to sing the song, play it at least twice and let everyone enjoy marching around.

Lyrics for “Months march”

Ready … March!

January (January)
February (February)
March (March)
April (April)
May (May)
June (June)
July (July)
August (August)
September (September)
October (October)
November (November)
December (December)

Everybody … Stop!

Ready … March!

January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December.

Everybody … Stop!

Gestures for “Months march”

The actions are very simple for the song:

If you have a large room with plenty of space for everyone to march around:

Get everyone to line up facing forwards. Everyone must stand to attention like soldiers (chin up, chests out, perfectly straight and still)
Start the music and get everyone to march in time to the music on the command, “Ready … March!”. Everyone needs to march in a perfect line, arms swinging up to the horizontal.
The first verse of the song is a call / repeat style: the singer calls out the months and everyone repeats. Have everyone marching up and down the classroom shouting out the months.
On the command, “Everybody … Stop!” everyone stops and stands to attention, perfectly still. Then start marching again on, “Ready … March!”.
This time there is no repeating. Students have to remember the months and shout them out as they march.

If you only have a small room or don’t have much space:

Follow the same steps as above but get everyone to march on the spot.

[hide_on_uk]Short sample (members get full-length song):
<br /> [/hide_on_uk]

[hide_on_us]Short sample (members get full-length song):
<br /> [/hide_on_us]

5. Read classroom reader “Silly Willy’s months”
Let’s follow the song with a reader which uses the all of the months vocabulary. Before class, download and print off the reader “Silly Willy’s months”. As you go through each page, point to the pictures and elicit the months, as well as other vocabulary including weather and the things the characters are doing, for example:

Teacher: (pointing at the picture on page 3) Look at Silly Willy! What is he doing?
Students: Sunbathing!
Teacher: Yes, that’s right! But is it hot?
Students: No, it’s cold. It’s snowing.
Teacher: Yes, that’s right! Silly, Silly Willy! So, what month do you think it is when it’s snowing?
Students: January?
Teacher: Let’s check (reading) “Where Silly Willy lives, January and February are very cold. But Silly Willy likes to sunbathe!”. So it’s January and February.

Get the students really involved in the story by asking lots of questions about the weather during different months and activities they do (and don’t do) in their country, for example:

Teacher: Do you like to sunbathe in January and February?
Students: No!
Teacher: Why not? What is the weather like here in January and February?
Students: It’s cold and rainy.
Teacher: So, when do you like to sunbathe?
Students: In August.
etc.

After reading the story, give out a reader worksheet to each student and have everyone try to remember which months Silly Willy did the different things. Then read through the story one more time (without stopping for questions, etc.) and check through the answers as a class.

Alternatively, watch our video version of the reader (Internet connection required).

6. Do “Months order” worksheet
Give out the “Months order” worksheet to each student. As your students are doing their worksheets, circulate and ask questions (e.g. “What month is it?”, etc.).

Wrap up:

Assign homework: “Months scramble” worksheet

Click for wrap up suggestions for the end of your lessons

Print this wrap up section

1. Assign homework
Each week give out a homework worksheet for your students to take home. Hold up the homework worksheet and model how to do it. Give out the worksheets and say, “Put your homework in your bags”.

2. Do “Quick check”
Time to leave the class. Make sure everything is put away and the students have gathered their belongings. Have them line up at the door and place yourself between the door and the students. For each student check one new word or phrase, for example:

hold up an object or flashcard (such as an item of clothing) and ask, “What’s this?”
ask a question from the lesson (e.g. “Where do you live?”, “Do you like bananas?”, “Can you play chess?”, etc.)

When they give you the correct answer say goodbye and let them leave. If their answer is wrong, have them go back to the end of the line – they will have to try again once they reach the front!