5 Activities for a Kindergarten ESL Zoom Class

Regardless of if you teach online with VIPKID or another online teaching company, teaching classes via Zoom is TOUGH — ESPECIALLY when your teaching ESL to Kindergarten kiddos. Teaching ESL to Kindergarten aged children is difficult enough in person, so doing it through Zoom can almost feel impossible.

I am still teaching all of my Kindergarten ESL classes in-person in Portugal, but there is always the possibility of schools closing with the recent second wave of the Coronavirus currently hitting Europe. I have also just begun teaching private Zoom lessons to one of my Kindergarten students who has chosen to stay home from school this year. So, I am in desperate need of activities to do with Kindergarteners on Zoom. Of course, I turned to Google, and surprise surprise there was nothing really useful out there for “Kindergarten Zoom activities”. Are there no other people out there teaching ESL Kindergarten Zoom classes?! (Seriously comment on this post if you are too so I know that I am not alone!).

Something else I find when researching activities to do with just my in-person Kindergarten classes is that ESL websites are EXTREMELY (yes, this is the third time I’ve used caps in my intro — please feel my frustration) unrealistic in regards to what ESL students this age are actually capable of doing. However, I will save that rant for another blog post. So in conclusion, here are a few activities I have found that actually work well with this age group during Zoom lessons:

1. Flashcards

Materials Needed: Flashcards (duh)

Flashcards are an amazing way to teach children new vocabulary words both in-person and online. Simply show a flashcard and have your students repeat the word 2–3 times. My students love repeating the words in a fun way, maybe through different volumes or by singing the words. If possible, always include Total Physical Response (TPR) by acting out the words and encourage your students to do the same.

One flashcard game my students love to play and can easily be done via zoom is a simple “yes or no” question game. Hold up a flashcard (like a flashcard with a dog on it) and ask your students, “Hmmm, what’s this? Is this a dog?” Your students will either reply with “Yes!” or “No!”. My students love this game, especially when I hold up the wrong flashcard and they correct me as to what it is!

Another Zoom specific flashcard game is the “flying flashcard”. Simply take a flashcard and move it quickly from side to side in front of your camera. Ask your student if they know what it is, fly the flashcard slower across the screen until they are able to correctly identify it.

2. Pictionary

Materials Needed: Whiteboard or Paper and Markers

Warning: drawing skills are necessary for this activity. All you need is a whiteboard or be able to hold up a piece of paper while you draw an image for your student. Since this is an ESL class, of course, you want to draw a vocabulary word that your student knows or just learned. Slowly draw the image and allow your student to guess what it is while you are drawing. Once they successfully guess the vocabulary word, have them draw a new image and you guess what it is!

3. Scavenger Hunt

Materials Needed: Flashcards

A perfect Zoom activity! Students will LOVE showing you different things in their house and it is a great way to get them moving during an online lesson. An easy scavenger hunt is to ask your students to find an object of a specific color as there will be plenty of things for them to show you. Make sure to show them a flashcard of what you would like them to find. You can make this game more fun by setting a timer and counting down the seconds until your student returns to their screen with the object in hand.

4. Guided Drawing

Materials Needed: Google Slides and Whiteboard or Paper and Markers

This has been my go-to activity throughout my private ESL lessons with a 5-year-old girl. Choose a vocabulary word related to the topic of the lesson and make a slideshow with Google Slides that includes a step-by-step guide for how to draw the vocabulary word. For example, one lesson I taught her was about farm animals. Before the lesson, I googled “how to draw a pig step-by-step” and copied the images over to Google Slides, with each step on its own slide. During the lesson, I shared my screen with my student and we went through each step of how to draw a pig from my slideshow. I followed the steps and drew a pig on my whiteboard. This was a great way to introduce body part vocabulary as well by instructing my student, “Ok, now we have to draw the eyes! How many eyes does a pig have?”.

5. Storytime

Materials Needed: Picture Books or YouTube

Of course, with this age group, you will want to try to incorporate storytime into your Zoom lessons, because who doesn’t love a good story? If you are like me and budget is limited to be buying picture book after picture, then a Zoom lesson is your ideal scenario. There are so many read-aloud stories on YouTube where the book is scanned and there is a voiceover reading the story. Simply share your screen with the student, mute the audio of the YouTube video, and read the story yourself!