7 Activities for Teaching the Present Progressive for the ESL Classroom

The present progressive is one of the most important tenses in the English language. As it describes actions currently happening, it's quite an easy tense to teach using a variety of fun and interactive activities. Here are 7 activities for teaching the present progressive for the ESL classroom.

1. Look Around

Have your class make observations about what’s happening all around in the classroom and outside the windows. Make sure they students use the present progressive when describing what they see.

2. A Letter Home

Ask your students to write a letter to a parent, relative or friend describing their life as an ESL student. What are they doing to improve their English? What are they doing right now in class?

Also read: 7 Activities for Teaching the Present Perfect for the ESL Classroom

3. A Picture’s Worth

Prepare a variety of interesting pictures to share with your class. This can include anything from ads in a newspaper or picture books. Hand out the pictures to your students and have them describe what is happening in the images one by one.

4. Charade Call Out

Charades are a useful tool for a variety of ESL activities. To practice the present progressive, have one of your students act out an activity (riding a bike, ironing clothes, swimming, etc.) and have the other students guess what he/she is doing using the present progressive. Students can ask questions such as “Are you riding a bike?” - and the student can give answers like “Yes, I am” or “No, I’m not.”

5. What are you doing?

Brainstorm different places your students go to during the week: the library, the gym, the grocery school, school, etc. Then, pair up your students and have them write sentences using the present progressive describing what people are doing in the places brainstormed earlier.

6. Sorry, I Can’t

Have your students think of things they cannot do right now because they are busy doing something else; such as “Sorry, I can’t come out to play right now, I am studying English.” Once your students have written down a few sentences, have them read them out loud in front of the class

7. Picture Perfect

Pick a set of interesting photos from a magazine or the Internet and have one of your students describe one of the pictures to the the other students using the present progressive. They must then guess which picture the student is describing.

Also read: 7 Misconceptions about TEFL Uncovered

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