This is the simplest game you can play with this excellent set of cards.

I always carry a set of animal trump cards in my bag. They provide great language practice and the kids love using them, even at higher levels. With a group, you can play this game in a circle with each pair having a card. At the end, each pair guesses the animal before it is revealed (‘We think it is a lion’ or ‘We guess it is a gorilla’).

I have played this with 4-year-olds who couldn’t read a word, but did recognize and know numbers up to 15. I simply introduced the questions with pantomime and they knew where on the card to find the right number. It is actually an advantage if they can’t read yet, because on the cards are the categories written and when kids can read they often say ‘How speed is your animal?’ instead of ‘How fast is your animal?’

In the beginning students will need some help with guessing (e.g. making the animal sound), but later on they will recognize the cards by the values for the different categories much faster (as you can see in the video with Livia).

If students can’t guess after the 6 ‘how questions’, they can ask additional questions like: ‘What colour is the animal?’, ‘How many legs does it have?’, ‘Can it swim/fly/climb?’ or even ‘What sound does it make?’.

Problem -Solution -Problem:

Problem: Some students go straight for the guessing and don’t practice asking the ‘How questions’.

Solution #1: Each team can only guess once and then they are OUT.

Problem: Teams that are OUT start disturbing the lesson.

Solution #2: Print some (real fake) money and open the Casino. Each team gets some fake money and every round they have to put some money on the table to play. If they guess wrong, the House (me) takes the money, but they can still play as long as they put in some new money. If they guess right, they win all the money tht was put in.

You can find the fake money in the download section.