Grammar games

[Ravshan Ergashev]

The group members who have been selected for the important task step outside the room with the teacher and are told to hide the pot of gold in some secluded but accessible location at least fifty paces away from the classroom door. At this stage they should be instructed only to find a very good hiding place for the treasure as quickly as possible and return to the classroom.
Once all class members in charge of hiding the treasure have returned, they are told to rejoin their groups but to say nothing until further instructed. They are then told to give careful oral instructions to the other group members as to exactly where they must go to find their group’s treasure. These instructions should be verbal only. No maps, gestures, or written notes are allowed. The other group members may ask as many questions as they wish. The one who hides the treasure must tell the others how to get from the classroom to the hiding place, not simply where it is.
The next game is “Where’s what’s it?” It can be used with all levels. This non-threatening guessing game is good way to wrap up a lesson on prepositions. The aims of this game are to practice the use of prepositions in a task-based situation. The procedure of this game is the following:
1. Before class begins place one of the objects on top of something, underneath something, or between two other things.
2. Divide the class into two teams or into groups.
3. Tell the class that they have to identify an object you have chosen in the classroom, using only yes/no questions about position (e.g., “Is it on the wall? Is it behind you”?).
4. Teams take turns asking position questions; no points are lost if the answer is incorrect.
5. Either team may try to guess the object at any time if they guess wrong, the point goes to the other side.
6. The first team to identify the object wins the point.

The role of games on language lessons.
Games offer students a fun-filled and relaxing learning atmosphere. After learning and practicing new vocabulary, students have the opportunity to use language in a non-stressful way. While playing games, the learners’ attention is on the message, not on the language. Rather than pay attention to the correctness of linguistic forms, most participants will do all they can to win. This eases the fear of negative evaluation, the concern of being negatively judged in public, and which is one of the main factors inhibiting language learners from using the target language in front of other people. In a game-oriented context, anxiety is reduced and speech fluency is generated–thus communicative competence is achieved.
Games are also motivating. Games introduce an element of competition into language-building activities. This provides valuable impetus to a purposeful use of language. In other words, these activities create a meaningful context for language use. The competitive ambiance also makes learners concentrate and think intensively during the learning process, which enhances unconscious acquisition of inputs. Most students who have experienced game-oriented activities hold positive attitudes towards them (Uberman 1998). An action research conducted by Huyen and Nga (2003), students said that they liked the relaxed atmosphere, the competitiveness, and the motivation that games brought to the classroom. On the effectiveness of games, teachers in Huyen & Nga’s (2003)reported that action research reported that their students seem to learn more quickly and retain the learned materials better in a stress-free and comfortable environment.
The benefits of using games in language-learning can be summed up in nine points.
Games: are learner centered.
1. promote communicative competence.
2. create a meaningful context for language use.
3. increase learning motivation.
4. reduce learning anxiety.
5. integrate various linguistic skills.
6. encourage creative and spontaneous use of language.
7. construct a cooperative learning environment.
8. foster participatory attitudes of the students

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