Irregular verbs in context 1

Irregular verbs mind map

Teaching irregular verbs is really difficult. I have tried many different methods and I still feel that I have not succeeded. You can see several of my previous attempts at this site. For example there is a post on irregular verbs using associative method or a post with a rap with irregular verbs or a post with remembering tables.

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In this post I will try to teach the irregular verbs in context. I do not want my students to spend more time doing what we have already done. I want them to do something new with the irregular verbs which we have already dealt with.
In this post there are several quizzes, a mind map, four mnemonics a worksheet and a comic. I hope the results will justify the time spend on these.

Irregular verbs – introduction

Start with a pre-test. Ask your students to write the past tense and past participles of the following verbs:

go, buy, meet, feel, speak, say, come, find, lose, put, steal, know, make, think, give

The aim of such an activity is to show the gap and suggest that by the end of the lesson they will know all the past tenses.

You can try the quiz on your mobile phones here:
Irregular verbs – pre-test

Irregular verbs – Worksheet

You can download all the activities for the lesson here. It is a worksheet with all the activities to teach the irregular verbs:

Stolen wallet_original story_past simple

You can find the explanation of the Grammar UP activity here:

Irregular verbs – Additional materials

Of course, you could just use the worksheet as is. However, here are several improvements which you might find useful.
The first one is a mind map. It contains all the verbs in the past tense. I think that the best place to introduce the mind map is after the activity 2 (the reading). Moreover, there are the four mnemonics which should help the pupils remember the irregular verbs. Ask the students to memorize the four lines. Thus the students should learn all the irregular verbs.
Irregular verbs mind map
If your students have smartphones and your school is pretty hi-tec, you could use the following quizzes.
The first quiz is the Reading comprehension. Students can read the text online and then answer the multiple choice questions. If they get more than 70% of answers correct, they can play the game Make them fall:
Irregular verbs – Reading

In the second quiz students have to complete the text with the past tense of the verbs in brackets. If they get more than 70% of answers correct, they can play the game Tic Tac Toe.
Irregular verbs – Past tense

ADVERT:
[showmyadsa] In the third quiz students have to put the words into the correct order. Once again, if they pass the quiz they will get a chance to play the game Tower defence.

Irregular verbs – Tower Defence

Irregular verbs – The end

If you teach the above lesson, you must not miss the last step. The post test. Once again ask your students to write the past tense and past participles of the irregular verbs above or they could try the following interactive quiz.

Irregular verbs – post-test

I hope that the results now are much better than they were at the beginning of the lesson.

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13 Comments

  1. abubakar shehu
    nice lesson
    04/11/2014 at 2:25 pm
  2. jummai musa
    Nice work
    04/11/2014 at 4:21 pm
  3. ali
    I want learn english
    04/11/2014 at 11:26 pm
  4. kaisar
    awesome post
    05/11/2014 at 11:35 am
  5. Nara Luz
    Great!!! I'll use them with my students
    05/11/2014 at 5:46 pm
  6. sanjay kumar
    good information
    06/11/2014 at 4:09 am
  7. T.SRIHARI
    It is most useful to everybody
    06/11/2014 at 4:55 am
  8. T.SRIHARI
    It is most useful to everybody we thankful to this site
    06/11/2014 at 4:57 am
  9. Ashiqullah
    It was very practical lesson,I enjoyed that.
    06/11/2014 at 5:45 am
  10. Dä coy
    hallo
    06/11/2014 at 1:11 pm
  11. wow, you present so many different ways to learn English Irregular Verbs . That's a good thing though, as Irregular Verbs in the English language are really important. Lots of these verbs are in very frequent use and one can not encourage enough to learn them all at a very early stage!
    10/11/2014 at 7:05 pm
  12. Aryan
    Dear Sir/ Madam I hope this piece of communication finds you healthy. I am writing to give information about the video that was posted on this page. This video was quite confusing and inefficient, so I would like to see something more interesting. However the other things related to English learning is awesome. Thanks, Aryan
    15/11/2014 at 8:16 am
  13. Zdenda
    Dear Aryan, thank you for commenting. Please, could you specify what was confusing about the video. Thank you. Zdenda
    19/11/2014 at 3:23 am

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