The Language Teacher
02 - 2003

Name on Your Head

Erin Burke

Aichi Gakuin University

QUICK GUIDE

Key Words:Famous people, asking for information
Learner English Level: All
Learner Maturity Level: Junior high school and above
Preparation Time: None
Activity Time: 20-30 minutes
Materials: Small squares of blank paper, cellophane tape

Here's a fun game that can be used as a follow-on from the famous people activity above. Students will use the vocabulary they have already learned, but will ask for information about a famous person, rather than describe the person.

Procedure

Step1: Hand out a small slip of paper and a piece of tape to each student. Distributing tape can take a little while, so begin as the previous activity is tapering off, but before explaining how to play the game.

Step 2: Divide students into groups of four or five, each group sitting in as much of a circle as the furniture will allow.

Step 3: Ask students to write the name of a famous person on the small slip of paper, living or dead, Japanese or foreign. Cleopatra is a good example to give as students then realize the huge range they have to choose from. Stress that they should not tell anyone what they have written on the paper. They should also know a little about the person (at least approximate age, nationality, and why they are famous). The teacher can circulate, assisting with the spelling of foreign names where necessary.

Step 4: While the students are trying to think of a famous person to write on their papers, begin to write the following questions on the board:

Am I alive?
-dead?
-an animated character?
-female?
-male?
-a politician?
-an actor?
-seen on TV?
-between 20 and 30?
Is English my first language?
Do I live in Europe? etc.

The questions should only be of the yes/no type.

Step5: Using the tape, students tape their own piece of paper to the forehead of the person on their left, so that the name can be seen by the others in the group. When everyone has a piece of paper taped to their head, each student can see the name of the famous person on the other members' heads, yet they do not know the name written on the piece of paper on their own head.

Step 6: Students then proceed to ask questions to discover who they are. Every yes answer enables the asker to have another turn, and they can continue to ask questions until they receive a no, whereupon the next student asks a question. Tell the students that the questions on the board are only examples to get them started, and they will obviously need to think of many more for themselves. As some students may guess quite quickly, have a few pieces of paper with famous people on them that you have written yourself so that an early finisher can quickly be re-included in the game. Encourage students to take notes on the answers they receive, as it can become quite difficult to remember all the information.

Options

This game format also works nicely with other themes such as:

Occupations: Do I work indoors? Do I wear a uniform? Do I need special training? Do I work with people/my hands/tools/animals? etc.

Countries/prepositions: Am I in Europe? Am I next to Germany? Do my people speak Spanish? Do I have a seacoast? (A copy of a world map per student or group is useful for this.)