This is a fantastic activity for giving your students practice in asking and answering questions in the third person singular.
How to Run the Present Simple Interviews Activity
- Divide your students into pairs. If there is an odd number of students, the teacher can make up the odd pair at this stage.
- Give each pair a set of interview sheets. Note that each sheet contains the same questions, but the sequence is different to keep the activity from becoming too repetitive.
- Begin by eliciting the question word in the first column for each row, and have your students orally construct each question. Encourage your students to produce the full questions spontaneously during the interviews, rather than writing them down.
- Student A asks their questions and notes down keywords from Student B’s answers in the third column. When they are finished, have the students switch roles in their pairs. Set a clear time limit for the completion of this stage to keep the activity moving along.
- When all students have completed their interview sheets, have all the Student As stand up and rotate one place to the right so that they are now working with a different Student B. Now, have students ask and answer questions about their partner’s previous interview partner using the third person form of the present simple. If there was an odd number of students, the odd student can join a group of three and relate their answers about the teacher. Remember to emphasize that this is a speaking activity, so there is no need for students to write anything down.
- When everyone is finished, repeat the process. Have all the Student As stand up and rotate again, and ask and answer questions about their original partners. The repetition is helpful in cementing the form, and the change of partner keeps the activity interesting.
By following these steps, your students will get plenty of practice in using the third person singular form of the present simple while having fun and engaging conversations with their classmates.