Back writing is a fun game with a few different variations (see below) for pairs or groups to review writing and understanding the shapes of the alphabet.

The next letter game is played in teams of 4 at the maximum to practice alphabetical order with the goal being trying to recall as quickly as possible the next letter. A perfect warm up for when junior high school first grade are learning how to use the dictionary.

The ABCs is one of the first English lessons for 1st graders in Japanese junior high schools. Because school starts around the beginning of April, it's spring and it's a great time to run around outside while it's not too cold and not too hot.

This activity uses competition to make writing the alphabet fun. It should probably be paired with (and done after) a practice worksheet.

This is a great way for the young students to expend all that excited energy - fair warning: you'll need a lot of energy too!

Animal groups is an activity that uses the animal sounds as a way to communicate a student's agreement.

Animal train is a very fun and noisy game for an elementary English lesson on animal names and onomatopoeic animal sounds.

For junior high first graders, this group work activity encourages students to use their knowledge of the world and bring it to the English class.

Giving the students the words and letting them arrange the sentence is an oldie but a goodie. This game adds some movement and the element of recall to make it more fun and competitive.

Just like the old MB game, this activity is a lot of fun. It takes a while to explain/demonstrate but once the students start, they really get into it.

Doing the 'best time challenge' is just a fun way to get an elementary class to practice asking and answering a target dialogue a few times as a class. Nothing special, but it works and the students get into it.

This is a way to make the daily greeting more active, a great greeting activity for kindergarten English lessons.

Here are some free-to-download, bingo sheets with a super simple layout. 3x3, 4x4 or 5x5 layout with either one or two per A4 sheet.

Birthday groups gets students walking around and saying the month they were born in while listing to other's answers and deciding if a group should be made. Basically, it's practicing the months focusing on the student's own birthday.

Blackboard memory is a vocab drilling activity that uses a memory challenge to let you vary how you are learning the lesson's English vocabulary. A great way to keep the students focused when they need more drill time.

Rather than create a worksheet and use a lot of paper, doing a blackboard survey puts all the information up on the board for all students to see and review once the communication part of the activity is over.

This activity works well with most walk-and-talk information collecting communication activities. Also, it's a no-prep activity so you can use it any time.

Students practice introducing themselves (Hello, my name is ~.) and pretend that each time they shake hands they change bodies (or names). A lot of fun and to be honest, quite mentally challenging (but in a completely fun and hilarious way).

The bomb game is good for drilling vocab or basic conversation phrases. Students must say the target word/phrase before passing the "bomb". Everyone gets very excited playing this game but watch out because tensions can get high.

Cartoon birthdays lets you chat with elementary aged students about birthdays, months, and dates by connecting to your students through something that is of interest to most young people - cartoon characters. 

The circle memory game is a way to practice new vocab or short phrases in a group in a fun and challenging way. The main challenge is trying to remember everything that has been said so far!