Activity

Uso Baseball

The students play a baseball-themed game where they describe themselves.

Archived from Englipedia.
Originally submitted by James Hede on March 11, 2013.

MATERIALS NEEDED:

  • Blank paper
  • Dice

DETAILED EXPLANATION:

  • Begin by reviewing things that a student can write about themselves. Hobbies, club memberships, family members, pets, things which have happened in the past, are happening now, or what they want to happen in the future. It helps to give the beginnings of several sentences, such as "I want to be a ~", "My favorite sport is ~", "I can play the ~" etc.
  • The students write 6 sentences about themselves. These sentences can be about anything, and they can be either true or false. Beside the sentences, they mark whether it is true or false.
  • Draw a large baseball diamond on the chalk board. Also draw a place to keep score, and number of "strikes" and "outs".
  • The class is divided into 2 teams. One student from each team, I usually pick the front corner students to go first, and go row by row afterwards, come to the front with their sheets (kept hidden from each other). They play Janken to determine who is the pitcher, and who is the batter.
  • The pitcher stands beside the teacher (so the teacher can see his sheet) and reads his sentences one by one. After hearing each sentence, the batter says whether he thinks that sentence is true or false. If the batter is incorrect, then he gets a strike. 3 strikes is an out, and 3 outs changes the team at bat.
  • If the batter gets less than 3 strikes, then he can roll a die. A 1 or 2 on the die means first base, a 3 or 4 means second base, a 5 means third base, and a 6 is a home run (roll the die, divide by 2, round up. A 6 is a home run). The student who lands on a base has a marker placed on the board at the appropriate base. This marker can only move if it is "pushed" from behind by another player. If you like, you can decide if a student who doesn't score a home run may try to steal extra bases by playing Janken for them.
  • Two new students come up and play as above, continuing until 3 outs have been scored by the field team, whereupon the teams switch.

TEACHING SUGGESTIONS:

  • For larger class sizes, you may wish to drop the need for 3 outs, and have the students do both pitcher and batter in one turn. It loses some baseball flavor, but everyone will have a chance to play.
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Submitted by Englipedia Archive November 26, 2019 Estimated time: 15-30 min

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