A selection of English ESL boardgames printables

Culture, intercultural communication, cross-cultural communication

Adjectives to describe feelings, emotions

Adjectives to describe personality and character

Adjectives: Gradable / Non-gradable adjectives

BE + infinitive structures (e.g. he was to become famous)

Clauses of contrast (e.g.  although, while)

Clauses of purpose (e.g. in order to, so that, so as to)

Clauses of reason (e.g. because, because of, due to, as, since)

Cleft sentences (e.g. It's Joey we're looking for)

Comparison: Comparative adjectives and structures

Comparison: Superlative adjectives and structures

Conditional 2 (second conditional) - would

Conditionals: Conditional phrases (e.g. unless, provided that, as long as)

Conjunctions (aka connectives, e.g. and, but, or, so, then)

Contractions (shortened forms, e.g. don't, aren't, etc.)

Determiners (words that can come before nouns)

Formal and informal English (politeness or colloquial language)

Future perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Future perfect simple and continuous (progressive) tense

Future phrases (e.g. be about to, bound to, likely to, due to, set to + INF)

Homonyms (two words with the same pronunciation - homophones and homographs)

It as preparatory subject (e.g. it's raining, it's nice of you to)

Linking verbs (aka copulas, e.g. I am a student)

Nouns: Collective nouns (team, class, family, committee)

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how to accuse somebody of something in English

how to apologize, say sorry, forgive and express regret in English

how to ask for information and make inquiries in English

how to ask for something, make requests in English

how to blame somebody for something in English

how to defend yourself from criticism in English

how to deny or admit something in English

how to describe things or people in English

how to emphasize important things in English

how to encourage or discourage people in English

how to evaluate people or progress in English

how to express agreement /disagreement in English

how to express approval and disapproval  in English

how to express cause and effect in English

how to express interest in something in English

how to express likelihood, probability in English

how to express likes and dislikes in English

how to express sequence and chronology in English

how to express shock and disbelief in English

how to express sympathy and condolences in English

how to give permission, authorization in English

how to inform somebody about some news in English

how to interpret what was said in English

how to keep a conversation going in English

how to make guesses about something in English

how to make, accept and refuse offers in English

how to order or make a booking in English

how to persuade, convince people in English

how to praise people and express appreciation in English

how to reassure somebody of something in English

how to refuse and object to something in English

how to remind people of something in English

how to rephrase, paraphrase what was said in English

how to say thank you, express gratitude in English

Nouns: Proper nouns (names of people, cities, companies)

Oxymorons (phrases with words of contradictory meaning, e.g. living dead)

Participles: Past participle (e.g. HAVING DONE)

Participles: Present participle (e.g. DOING)

Parts of Speech (aka word classes, e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs)

Past perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Phonetics (pronunciation, IPA, phonetic symbols)

Plural nouns: regular plurals with S ending

Prefixes (e.g. A, UN, IM, DIS, MIS, EN, etc. )

Prepositions vs adverbs (e.g. before me, saw him before.)

Prepositions: Double prepositions (e.g. out of)

Prepositions: Participle prepositions (e.g. pending, concerning)

Prepositions: Phrase prepositions (e.g. by means of)

Present perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Present perfect simple or present continuous tense

Present simple tense: S for third person singular verbs

Present simple vs continuous (progressive) tense

Pronouns: EACH OTHER, ONE ANOTHER (reciprocal pronouns)

Pronouns: Possessive pronouns (e.g. my, mine)

Pronouns: Reflexive pronouns (e.g. myself, yourself))

Pronouns: SOMEBODY, ANYBODY, EVERYBODY, NO ONE, NOTHING, etc.

Pronouns: THIS, THAT, THESE, THOSE (demonstratives)

Pronouns: YOU and THEY to talk about people in general

Quantifiers (e.g. some, many, much, any, few, little)

Questions: WH questions (open-ended questions)

Reported speech: reported questions (indirect questions)

There is / there are / there was / there were / there will be, etc.

Verbs: Transitive or intransitive verbs (words that can or cannot stand with objects)

Working with Paragraphs: unmixing and titling

Role play, miming, drama activity or improv game

Pictionary (picture dictionary) or picture matching

Writing an opinion essay (persuasive essay)

Learners who are Pre-A1 have just begun learning English and will first learn how to:<ul><li>Say the letters in the alphabet and numbers</li><li>Say hello, talk about names and age</li><li>Name the colors and dates, express likes and dislikes</li></ul>

Absolute beginners who have begun to learn the letters and numbers

Learners taking the A1 Elementary exam should be able to:<ul><li>Introduce themselves and ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, things he/she has, people he/she knows.</li><li>Communicate using very basic phrases as long as the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: common adjectives & adverbs of frequency, going to, how much/how many, imperatives, I'd like, 's – possessive, common prepositions of place and time, present simple & continuous, there is/are</li></ul>

A very basic tourist level, which is enough for buying food and a bus ticket

Learners taking the A2 Pre-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand sentences and frequently used expressions (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment).</li><li>Complete tasks that are routine and exchange information about familiar matters.</li><li>Describe matters of immediate need in simple terms.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: countable/uncountable nouns, adverbs of frequency, future will/going to, much/many, present perfect, past simple, past continuous, common phrasal verbs, common modals: can/should</li></ul>

A tourist who can do basic conversations about the past, present and future

Learners taking the B1 Intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand points regarding family, work, school or leisure-related topics.</li><li>Deal with most travel situations in areas where the language is spoken.</li><li>Create simple texts on topics of personal interest.</li><li>Describe experiences, events, dreams, and ambitions, as well as opinions or plans in brief.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: question tags, intensifiers: too/enough, future tenses, past tenses, modals, conditionals, wh-questions in the past</li></ul>

Learners who can deal with both familiar and routine situations, in friendly and work contexts

Learners taking the B2 Upper-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialization.</li><li>Interact with fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without difficulty for either party.</li><li>Produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain an opinion on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: perfect tenses, mixed conditionals, modals in the present, phrasal verbs, reported speech, wish, relative clauses</li></ul>

The level where you can be a tour guide for your foreign friends and talk about a lot of topics, even abstract ones, with ease and fluency

Learners taking the C1 Advanced exam should be able to: Express ideas fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions. Use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes. Understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts. Produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, using linking phrases (=words that connect ideas between sentences). Main grammar points to know: inversion, mixed conditionals, modals in the past, all passive forms, phrasal verbs (all patterns), wish/if only for regrets

Learners who can smoothly communicate in every walk of life, read long texts and write well

Learners taking the C2 Proficient exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand almost everything read or heard with ease.</li><li>Summarize information from a variety of sources into a coherent presentation.</li><li>Express themselves using precise meaning in complex scenarios.</li><li>Can express him/herself spontaneously, very fluently and precisely, differentiating finer shades of meaning even in the most complex situations</li></ul>

Get here and you are ready to study in English at university

I made another version of the well-known Guess Who boardgame for ESL learners with characters I created using the avatar creator tool at <a href="http://avachara.com" target="_blank" title="http://avachara.com">http://avachara.com</a> . Sample questions and gameplaying expressions can be found on the second page of the worksheet. 
 
There is a related Guess who boardgame that you may also want to play for the sake of variety: 
<a href="https://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/guess_who_with_25_characters/present-continuous-progressive/109463" target="_blank" title="https://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/guess_who_with_25_characters/present-continuous-progressive/109463">https://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/guess_who_with_25_characters/present-continuous-progressive/109463</a> 
 
The game is meant to give you an opportunity for practising speaking with your class in a fun way. 
 
Here's how to play the Guess Who game in ESL class: Hand out one copy of the boardgame to each student. Put students in pairs and let each student choose a 'mystery person' secretly. Each student needs to guess each other's mystery person faster than their partner. It is only allowed to ask 'YES' or ‘NO’ questions (and of course, answer 'YES' or 'NO'). If something is unclear from the picture, your students can respond by saying "I can't tell" or "It's not possible to tell" (in this case, you can decide whether the student can ask another question, or if it's their partner's turn). Question by question, students narrow down the list of possible mystery persons until they feel confident enough to make a guess. Usually when one has been ruled out of the last two persons remaining. 
 
I recommend that you hand out one transparent plastic foil along with each Guess Who boardgame. Students can place the foil over the boardgame and using an erasable magic marker cross out on it the characters that they have ruled out. 
 
How do students figure out who cannot be their opponent's mystery person? For example, "Is your person blond?" If the answer is 'Yes', then they cross out all the characters that are not blond. If the answer is 'No', they cross out all the characters that are blond. 
 
Encourage students to answer with auxiliary verbs, not just a simple Yes or No, e.g. "Yes, he or she is/does", "No, he or she isn't/doesn't" (using the form "he or she" until the gender of the mystery character has been revealed in order to keep this info hidden). Once the gender is revealed, they can go on using the specific gender in responses, e.g. "Yes, he is", "Yes, he does", "No, he isn't", No, he doesn't". You could also opt for forbidding questions about the mystery person's gender. This way you'll see longer games and more questions. 
 
You can use this worksheet in your ESL/EFL classes to practise body parts, clothes, (garments and accessoriese), and asking closed (Yes/No) questions in an entertaining way. Playing this game is a proven way of getting your students engaged in speaking English. 
 
I recommend using this ESL printable worksheet up till pre-intermediate level, as the game is focused on asking questions and giving short answers in the Present Simple tense using the auxiliary verb 'have', and the Present Continuous tense using the verb "wear".

Guess Who boardgame with 20 characters

Practice wh-questions using a image. You can use it as a boardgame, going through the board with a dice and getting points for each correct answer or asking the children to answer as many questions as they can in the time you say.

wh- questions using a image

Name 2 things a person or a thing does. Students are to respond using the 3rd person affirmative of the present simple. For example: A cow gives us milk. It eats grass. etc. Lots of possible answers for every square. Thanks to PhilipR for the template. 

Present Simple Boardgame

A game for elementary and pre-intermediate students to practise using the present perfect. You will need dice & counters for this game. It can be laminated or used in a plastic sleeve. Roll the die and count the spaces. Land on a space and make a sentence with the words given. eg: He/eat/his lunch elicits the sentence: He has eaten his lunch.

Present Perfect Game

Game for beginners to practice asking and answering questions using the verb to be with you/we/they. Easier board game with "are they" only found here. <a href="http://en.islcollective.com/worksheets/worksheet_page?id=34523" target="_blank" title="http://en.islcollective.com/worksheets/worksheet_page?id=34523">http://en.islcollective.com/worksheets/worksheet_page?id=34523</a>

Astronauts  Boardgame

It's a boardgame with the Flintstones to practice the past of some of the most common irregular verbs in everyday english and the time. Every time they land on a square they build a sentece in Past simple :)

Irregular Verbs Flinstones Boardgame

Practice the past simple in all forms using a pirate theme. Additionally each square could be used for all forms.A pirate theme to liven things <a href="http://up.Clip" target="_blank" title="up.Clip">up.Clip</a> art from <a href="<a href="<a href="http://MyCuteGraphics.com" target="_blank" title="http://MyCuteGraphics.com">http://MyCuteGraphics.com</a> 
 
Thanks to PhilipR for the template.

Pirates Battle Past Simple:Boardgame

The game is played in groups from 2 to 4. Each player chooses one character (Lisa, Homer, Bart or Marge).The objective of the game is to talk about ONE of The Simpsons characters and speak about his/her daily routine. Instructions and cards included :)

Simpsons Boardgame Daily Routine

A game that includes famous monuments, common disasters, and world capitals. Students should prepare before playing by studying the FAMOUS LANDMARKS and DISASTER CARDS. 
 
 When the player lands on a square, he/she needs to explain about the landmark or disaster or provide a world capital. If the player cannot, then he/she loses a turn. 
 
You can move in any way around the board until you reach the finish line. This game was inspired by a student who is a geography nut. 
 
Disaster cards: 
 
 <a href="http://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/disaster_cards_4_lets_explore_boardgame/weather-disasters-weather/72195" target="_blank" title="http://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/disaster_cards_4_lets_explore_boardgame/weather-disasters-weather/72195">http://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/disaster_cards_4_lets_explore_boardgame/weather-disasters-weather/72195</a> 
 
Famous landmark cards: 
 
<a href="http://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/famous_landmark_cards_4_lets_explore_game/places-landmarks-monuments/72196" target="_blank" title="http://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/famous_landmark_cards_4_lets_explore_game/places-landmarks-monuments/72196">http://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/famous_landmark_cards_4_lets_explore_game/places-landmarks-monuments/72196</a>

Around the World Boardgame

This is a boardgame to practice giving advice. Students have to give advice about different problems. You can use it to practice one structure (e.g. should/If I were you...) or to use any structures to give advice with more advanced They can also be asked to tell more than 1 piece of advice. I hope you'll enjoy this game.

Giving advice boardgame

This is a boardgame for practising wh-questions. In the middle pupils can find the information and use them to answer the questions. The idea is to use a dice and get point when a question is answered correctly. You can go round as many times as you want.

BOARDGAME WH-QUESTIONS

Safari boardgame to review the past simple and the past continuous tenses. Focus on safari animals and appropriate safari vocabulary. A great way to practice your conversational skills and have fun while doing it.

39 English ESL worksheets pdf & doc: boardgames