What Is Vocab-tainment?

Several individuals find it difficult to express themselves fluently in English; the fundamental issue is a lack of vocabulary. Reading a lot is one of the most effective ways to expand your vocabulary, but what if you don't like reading? This is where vocab-tainment comes into play. 

The term “vocab-tainment” refers to student-centered, interactive, and engaging vocabulary-learning activities (or games). Furthermore, it is learning vocabulary in an entertaining way that is centered on the learner's interests.

Learn English with Bathabile (LEWB) is all about the learner! Our teaching methods are customised to the needs of the students. Every individual is unique, and as a result, everyone learns differently. At LEWB, we employ vocab-tainment to teach vocabulary in a way that students can acquire and understand efficiently.

Here are some examples:

Activity 1
“Back To The Board”

This activity is usually better with older, higher-level children, as they can describe words with more confidence.

Put your class into small teams and have one player from the first team come to the front. They now sit, facing the class, with their backs to the board (they are not allowed to turn around and look at the board).
The teacher now writes some words on the board that the students have recently been studying or should know. Their team now has 60 seconds to describe as many of the words as possible to their teammate. After 60 seconds, count how many words they got right, and then it's the next team's turn. Keep going until every team has had a turn.

Activity 2
“Word Tennis”

Divide your class into 2-4 teams and have them sit in groups. Give a category, i.e., colors, and the first team must say a color, then the second team must say a different colour. Keep going around until one team either repeats a word or hesitates for too long. The other team scores a point.

Now give a new category, i.e., 'shapes'. Teams take turns saying shapes until one team repeats a shape or hesitates. The other teams again win a point. The first team to score six points is the winner.

The good thing about this activity is that the teacher decides the categories, which means the teacher can make it as easy or as difficult as they like and tailor it to perfectly suit any class. Game, set, and Match!

Activity 3
“Stop The Bus”

Put your students into small teams and have them sit around separate tables or in small circles on the floor. Each team needs a piece of paper and some pens. When you're ready, write a letter on the board, for example, 'T, and shout 'Go!' The teams now must write as many words as they can, beginning with T. At any given point, any student can shout out 'STOP THE BUS!' and everyone must put down their pens and stop writing.

The team with the most words spelled correctly is the winner. Students usually call out 'Stop the Bus' when they think their team has a lot of words and feel that they can't be caught, but sometimes it backfires and another team has more! A quality warmer!