Irregular Verbs Rods Game

Paco Francia, Spain

Secondary English teacher in Spain for around twenty years and enjoying every second of it. Have worked at summer immersion camps with kids in the States and England. Lives in Zamora (Spain) and works in a village of same called Toro.
Email: pacofrancia.ies@gmail.com

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Introduction
Background
Procedure

Introduction

This is a little gamey way to make irregular verb practice not so boring and still useful.

Background

After attending Paul Davis’ workshop on rods (as seen by Gattegno and Co.) I got myself a pack and started surfing the net and thinking of ways to use them. I found quite a lot of them, but this one had been wandering on my mind for some time till I finally sat down and gave it a playable form.

Procedure

1. Teams of up to three players, or maybe up to four teams, else it’ll get a bit messy.
2. Every team has several sets of rods, in order to be able to make up the different patterns of irregular verbs:
   • put - put - put: all three forms are the same, three rods with the same colour
   • tech - taught - taught: present has one form and past and past participle share a common one: three rods, two colours
   • come - came - come: present and p.p. share a form and past tense has a different vowel: three rods two colours
   • bear - bore - born: three different forms (you can still get some more groups out of this one, but if wouldn’t be useful for this little game).
3. One team poses a question by placing three rods on the table so that everybody can see them. Teams bang on the table or raise their hand as they think of a verb to fit the pattern shown.
4. The teacher will act as referee, but teams must keep score of verbs mentioned, since any team using a verb that’s been used before will have a point struck off their tab. But students from other teams must call up their mistake for this to happen.

A list of irregular verbs I use in my classes (modified for this purpose) can be found at verbs4rods, but if you need a regular list of irregular verbs, this can also be found here.

Please check the Creative Methodology for the Classroom course at Pilgrims website.