The Desert Island
This team game is called “The Desert Island.” It is a fantastic activity because it allows your students to practice communication skills and learn how to work in a team in English. This is also a great opportunity for your students to get really creative and show their survival skills!
- Inform your students that, for the purposes of this game, they are all going to spend a year on a desert island. The only food they have are coconuts, but they will always have enough drinking water.
- Ask every student to think about 10 things they want bring with them to the desert island. Please explain to them they are not allowed to bring people or unlimited quantities of anything.
- You can give your students further guidelines by reminding them they should be thinking about food, shelter, fire, and entertainment.
- Allow your students to read their lists and briefly explain why they chose a particular item.
- Now divide your class into two or three teams, depending on the class size. If you are only working with 6 or fewer students, they can all stay together in one team.
- Tell your students that they have to jointly come up with a list of 8 things they are bringing to the desert island as a team.
- Closely follow the discussions and help them out if they are struggling to reach an agreement.
- At the end, ask one or two members of each team to present their complete or incomplete lists and explain major points of disagreement.
Each student should be given a chance to present their ideas and try to make an argument as to why the items they selected are essential. During the group discussion, you shouldn’t interrupt them too much, but you should definitely act as a mediator if a particular student is not having their ideas heard.
If you allow your students to use a dictionary during this activity, they will be able to learn many new words which relate to this topic. Furthermore, they will enjoy trying to convince other people their ideas are the best while developing important communication skills.
