A selection of English ESL animals printables with general speaking practice, speaking practice

This is a reading comprehension worksheet about unique animals. It's for students with A2 / B1 level English. Students read four short texts about some animals and then answer the questions on the second worksheet. It's best to do so in pairs or small groups to engage speaking and teamwork.

Unique Animals - B1 level Reading Comprehension

Short reading comprehension worksheet on a recent news report about the death of Kiska, the last killer whale to be held in captivity in Canada. There are also some discussion questions to spark conversation at class and to debate about animal welfare.

The loneliest whale in the world dies in Canada

Print off and cut up one set of cards per group. Put the students in groups of 2-4. Students deal the cards evenly between group members. Each player must only look at their top card. Decide which player will go first. Play can happen in two ways:

Straight game - Player chooses an attribute of their animal that they think will beat their group mates. Read out the number. Other players read out their numbers for corresponding attribute. The player with the highest number gets one point. This player can choose the attribute on the next turn. Players can then discuss and compare the attributes of each animal using comparative and superlatives.

Discussion - Each player names their animal and the group discusses which attributes they think will be strongest for each animal. Then the player whose turn it is must make their decision on which attribute to choose. This method may involve more use of language and practice of comparatives and superlatives. The highest number gets one point as above.

Remember this is also a QR code activity, so you could save yourself the time and paper and have them do it on their smartphones. Visit english-able.com for QR codes and a lot more like this.

Animal Top Trumps


Guess the names of some animals reading the lines.


Pay attention to the words (marked with orange colour) at the end of every line. The answers should be rhymed with these words.


Animal Rhymes For Beginners

First, students match key words from the reading with their definitions. Then they read the article and complete the gaps with appropriate words. In the next exercise students create comparative and superlative forms of adjective and answer a few questions about animals using comparatives and superlatives.

Koalas: Survival of the dumbest (worksheet to practice comparative and superlative adjectives)

This worksheet is about tigers. This worksheet is about tigers' species, features, diet, habitat, life expectancy, and threats. It's a fun task to talk about animals in danger of extension.

Let's Learn About Tigers

In this lesson, the students will first learn some new vocabulary and then watch a video about crows. After the video, they will complete a true/false exercise, correct the false statements and, finally, discuss with the teacher about what animals they find the most fascinating and why. 

Listening and vocabulary practice: Why Crows Are as Smart as 7 Year Old Humans

It is a very basic worksheet. It practises eight sentences - four questions, four answers. In the end students are supposed to discuss the questions and come up with their own answers.

A Favourite Animal - exercises, speaking

Prepositions of place
This is the 4th worksheet about the Taylor Family. See previous worksheets for other grammar points.

Background
This a a worksheet from a book that I created to help visual learners review grammar, learn vocabulary and practice speaking. The book is about a typical family who live in England. John and Sue are the parents of Emily and Peter. They live with their dog Barney. 

Introduction
This worksheet can help learners practice a number of different things, for example,
             - vocabulary
             - prepositions of place

Task 1: Look at the worksheet and using vocabulary describe each picture. Don't make 
             sentences with prepositions just yet, i.e,
             'In this picture there is a sofa.'
             
Task 2: Using prepositions of place learners say where Barney's bone is, i.e,
             'The bone / Barney's bone is ON the sofa and BETWEEN Peter and Emily.'

Task 3: If you have two learners, they can ask each other questions, i.e,
             A: 'Where is Barney's bone in this picture?'
             B: 'It's on the floor.'
             A: 'Is Barney's bone on the floor?'
             B: 'No, it isn't. It is on the sofa.'

The Taylor Family - prepositions of place

Cut out the animal pictures (or use the ones provided on page 2), then ask your students to sort the animals into 4 groups: animals that can fly, swim, jump and climb trees. Stick each animal in the correct category with glue sticks, then say aloud the sentences:

"A penguin can swim."

"A rabbit can’t climb trees."

"A frog can jump and swim." etc

Can/Can't Sorting Worksheet With Animals

Complete the sentences with the correct group names.


Fill in the blanks with the correct collective noun for each bird. Use the words from the Word Bank.


Students will learn rare and interesting collective nouns, enriching their vocabulary and making their language more expressive. Many group names are metaphorical or poetic (e.g., a murder of crows), helping students understand deeper meanings and cultural associations.

Fill in the Blanks. Birds and Their Group Names.

General speaking practice

Animals

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

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how to express agreement /disagreement in English

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how to express likelihood, probability in English

how to express likes and dislikes in English

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how to express shock and disbelief in English

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how to give permission, authorization in English

how to inform somebody about some news in English

how to interpret what was said in English

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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

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how to remind people of something in English

how to rephrase, paraphrase what was said in English

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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

11 Animals, General speaking practice, Speaking Practice English ESL worksheets pdf & doc