Countdown High/Middle School ESL Lesson.

This is a great game lesson plan, perfect for any lessons you are given on short notice or if the students need a break before/after exams. Countdown is an English TV quiz show in which the contestants have to choose 9 vowels and consonants and then try to make as long a word as possible using these letters in 30 seconds. There is also a numbers game were the contestants have to choose 5 big or small numbers. A random number is then generated and the contestants have to add, subtract, multiply and divide the numbers to get as close to the generated number as possible. Here is a video so you can see both games in action!


First you should use the game in this link to play the game. They have included everything in real countdown including the timer with side effects and it really motivates the students to play.
To fit this game into a classroom setting I split my class into groups of 4/5 students. I let each group have a turn choosing the letters or the numbers. I then gave my students 1 minute (so I timed it my self for 30 seconds, then used the timer on the game) to get the longest word they can. I would then ask each group to find who had the longest word, then give the group with the longest word 1 point. I would do 4 letters rounds for every one numbers round. For the lesson finale I would show them the countdown video below and ask them to try and find out the answer. Funnily enough no one has got it correct yet!