Are you tired of losing precious class time waiting for students to move their desks? Trying to set up rules and instructions, keeping desks clear of technology, all while trying to keep some form of classroom management? Whether it’s a new class or a review game that has been practiced time and time again but the students are too energetic from lunch, here are my favorite no-desk moving activity classroom warm ups.

These activities are usually around 5-10 minutes max at the beginning of class to engage students.

Most activities can be done in the following team format as shown below or in half groups:

      (black board)

T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 <- Question 1

T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 Q2

T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 Q3

T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 Q4

T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 Q5

1: Row by Row

Spelling, Q&A, or fill in the blank, this row by row team setup can be adapted for many question styles. One row of students (the bolded for question 1, one representing each team) will come to the front of the classroom and write their answer on the board. For example, show or say the translation in Japanese, then have the students write the English word/sentence with a time limit of 5-10 seconds in their designated spot on the black board. 

Once written, the teacher (or a student depending) circles the correct answers worth a point, explaining the reasoning. The rounds will repeat until however many times each student gets at least one turn.

2: Reading Race

Using passage sentences from the class textbook or a tongue twister, students will first read and repeat the sentences with the teacher, read in pairs together, then race against each other to see who is faster. With the small bit of time left, the students will compete in a quick tournament. Have each team elect a representative for their team so that there’s only 3 rounds. For 6 columns of desks, the tournament will be 6 students at the beginning, 1 per team, so 1v1 1v1 1v1, 1v1 1v1, then the final 1v1 round for the winner. Compared to having to wait for everyone to race against each other, this one is much faster and can feel more fair for shy students.

3: Lyric Listening

There are two ways to do this activity. One is where students are given an already prepared sheet with blank lyrics to be filled in during listening to the song. Using the same team style as the beginning figure, students can compare their notes to each other while in their seats. After, students will show the collectively filled in sheet to the teacher and the sheet with the most correct lyrics wins.

The second way is to have students have a blank piece of paper or blank “note” in their tablets. Students will write down all the words they hear. After switching papers with the enemy team, the answers will be shown that will be corrected by the enemy team. The team with the most words correct will get the highest score.

4: Telephone Game

A popular activity that I’m sure many teachers have already tried, this activity is  where a teacher whispers a phrase or sentence into a student's ear and the student whispers it repeatedly from student to student until it reaches the back of the row. The final student in the column will come to the front of their team as their representative and repeat the phrase. If it is correct, a point is given to the team.

5: TT (Team Teaching) Memorization Pronunciation

This activity is best for those who have TT, or team teaching where there’s an assistant teacher helping, classes. Divide the classroom into two teams, each teacher getting one team. “Grading” based on sentence pronunciation means 1 point per student,  the teacher walking from student to student  repeating the process till all 15 students are done, writing the score on the board. After competing however many rounds, the total tallied on the black board is the final score.

Also, for those who need an ending activity rather than a warm up activity, I recommend Bamboozle. While desks don’t need to be moved, students can sit next to each other to see the projector better. This website is free and keeps the students engaged with fun modes. I highly recommend this if you want a short less than 10 minutes review as well.

Happy planning and I hope your students enjoy the activities!

Header Photo by Allison Shelley/The Verbatim Agency for EDUimages