A selection of English ESL competitions printables

Culture, intercultural communication, cross-cultural communication

Adjectives to describe feelings, emotions

Adjectives to describe personality and character

Adjectives: Gradable / Non-gradable adjectives

Articles: Definite or indefinite article (a, an or the)

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)

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

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: ordering, 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

Giving personal opinions  		1.	If you ask me

2.	In my opinion

3.	Personally, I think

1.	What’s your opinion about?

2.	How do you feel about?

3.	What do you think about?	

1.	I agree with you

2.	I think so, too

3.	Yes, you’re quite right.

1.	Sorry, I can’t agree with you

2.	I don’t think so



competition

The series "Weird" brings texts about bizarre or extraordinary things. All texts have written exercises and topics for discussion. 

If you like this worksheet, you can find more "Weird " here:

https://en.islcollective.com/mypage/my-creations?search_key=Weird&type=printables&option=published&id=5163&grammar=&vocabulary=&materials=&levels=&studentTypes=&skills=&languageExams=&dialect=&functions=&page=1&sorting_type=most_newest&filter_type=filter_all&view_type=list&view_length=12



Weird competitions

A test paper for  a phonetic competition, transcription, pronunciation, stress

Phonetic competition

If you are dealing with fruit topic, it could be interesting to make a "fruit competition". Check how much fruit your students eat.

Fruit competition

This is a worksheet I made some time ago for a conversation class, on the topic of reading aloud, especially in competitions. I have a student who participates frequently in this kind of contests, so it was a useful resource to make her talk about it. Maybe some of you will find it useful. I hope you like it!

Reading aloud competitions

this is a physical competition where students see what they can do. Great for young learners, do it along with them and they love doing it. Can take anywhere from forty minutes to an hour, depending on the level and how many students you ask to try out each thing in front of the class. Best to go through each phase together and model the actions.

can/can't competition

It´s a text about a geography competion wih exercises of reading and interpretation. Exercises T(true) or F (false), interpretation and exercises about Tag questions. 

Texto: Geography Competition

Culture Quiz Competition with pictures and flag colouring.

Culture Quiz Competition

This game creates a very lively situation and makes students produce the Target Language. 

I tried this activity and it was a great success. I hope you will find it handy and helpful too. It's great for every level because you can adapt the content and include more difficult structures for comparative and superlative forms. 

It's great to fix grammar structures and to improve vocabulary.





Instruction stage 1

*PRINT on BOTH SIDES pp. 3-4 and 5-6.

1.	Divide students into pairs. 

Possibly, pair a ‘weak’ student with a ‘strong’ one so that pairs don’t finish too early. 



2.	To each group, give adjectives to one student to mix; 

give comparatives to the other student to mix.



3.	Students couple together the adj. with the right comparative. (tell students to give you back at least one deck of ADJECTIVES for the 2° stage at the end of the activity)*

Instructions stage 2

1.	Divide students into 2 groups.

2.	Take one set of adjs. and pile them up in two sets. Hand them in evenly to the two groups.



3.	Both groups pile up the notes in front of them. 



4.	One student from GROUP 1 picks a note. GROUP 2 discusses and one student tells the class the comparative form plus an example sentence. 



5.	If the student doesn’t make mistakes, the group he represents scores 2 points (1 point extra if they use ‘much’ or ‘a lot’). If they make mistakes, the student who picked the note from the opposite group can try as well. If he/she gets it right, the 

group is awarded 1 point. 



6.	Good structure = 0.5 / Accuracy = 0.5



RULES: 

•	In turn, every student makes an attempt.

•	No points awarded if students do not respect turns. 

•	If a group screws its possibility, the group who gave the wrong answer can try again and, if right, they can be awarded 0,5 points. 



Competition Comparative superlatives 

it is a test for pre-intermediate level students that help them for self test and to strength them to pass other exams in english for a certain purpose; moreover the test is preparing also the general exam.

Competitive food eaters

An elementary worksheet on ordinal numbers. It contains explanation and exercises.

Turtle competition - Ordinal numbers

Competition is hard to deal with in any language.  When you try to compete in your field and you don't have a firm grasp in a different language it makes it even harder to work your way up the food chain.  This is a group lesson meant for frontal learning.  

29 Competitions English ESL worksheets pdf & doc