Can you figure it out? ESL vocabulary puzzles

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Vocabulary puzzles

ESL vocabulary puzzles

photo of the author Justa |

LESSON OVERVIEW

This is a set of ESL vocabulary puzzles rather than a typical ESL Brains lesson plan. Each of the puzzles can be used separately as a time filler, a warm-up, etc. Students work with business-related compound nouns, word formation, money vocabulary and idioms. 

B1 / Intermediate
B2 / Upper Intermediate45 minStandard LessonPremium Plan
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ESL VOCABULARY PUZZLES – COMPOUND NOUNS AND WORD FORMATION

The first puzzle is an exercise in compound nouns. Students have to find business-related compound nouns (e.g. workmate, team leader, night shift). The nouns are hidden in fourteen pairs of sentences (e.g. Our sales are going down. We need to find a new person with a better strategy. – salesperson). The second puzzle is all about word formation. Students have to find pairs of words that take the same ending to create different words (e.g. success and stress take the ending -ful to create successful and stressful). There are ten pairs to find among twenty words. After finishing the task, students can give one more example of a word with a given ending.

MONEY VOCABULARY AND IDIOMS

In the third of the ESL vocabulary puzzles, students have to find twelve words related to money (e.g. refund, account, withdraw, budget) hidden within a series of words in the provided sentences. After finishing this activity, students could come up with their own sentences which hide other categories of words. They could also use some words to build similar sentences and find the hidden words in their partner’s sentences. Finally, there is the fourth puzzle which is related to idioms (go the extra mile, see eye to eye with someone, etc.). Students read eight sentences with idioms and find an incorrect word in each of them. Then, they try to correct the sentences. After finishing each of the puzzles, as an extension, students could create sentences with new words, make questions and ask them in pairs, write dialogues, etc.

WORKSHEETS

1

Comments

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Leave a Reply

  1. Rob Wilson

    Brilliant idea for fillers/warmers – more please.

    1. Justa

      Thank you! It’s great to hear that because we’ve been planning to prepare such a worksheet for a different level as well 🙂

      1. Gatita78

        That would actually be great!

        1. Justa

          You can check our other standalone worksheets here 🙂

  2. Mantas

    Well done! Really superb

    1. Justa

      Thanks 🙂

  3. Marta Zdanowicz

    Great Revision!!!
    Thx a lot 😉

  4. [email protected]

    Splendid! AA = absolutely amazing. filipe

    1. Justa

      Thanks, Filipe!

  5. pambrose60

    This lesson has been a massive success with my students, they want more like this.

    1. Justa

      Thanks! Good to know it’s useful! We’re planning to create more of these 🙂

  6. Ione Barros

    Excellent. Tks a million.

  7. Piece of Cake

    love this! would love to see something like this for higher levels as well

    1. Justa

      Thanks for the comment! We actually have a similar worksheet for higher levels. Click here to see it 🙂

  8. Naino

    This looks brilliant, and ideal for my students preparing the TOEIC. Can’t wait to try them out!

    1. Justa

      Great! Hope your students enjoy them 🙂

  9. Ashley Treacy

    More of these please very useful

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