Back to School: My Summer Holidays (A1-B1)

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This is a warmer/short conversation activity for use with lower-level students (A1-B1) to refresh past simple question formation. Download the handout below:

back-to-school-handout

Scrambled Questions

Unscramble the questions, and then ask them to your teacher:

1. summer your how holidays were?
2. did where go you?
3. there you did do what?
4. it did like you?

Ask and answer the questions in pairs.

Questions Words

Complete the questions with a question word:

Where    What (x2)    How (x2)    Who

 

1. ___________ was the weather like?
2. ___________ did you stay?
3. ___________ did you get there?
4. ___________ did you go on holiday with?
5. ___________ long did you go for?
6. ___________ was the best thing you did there?

Answer Match

Match the questions (1-6) with the answers (a-f)

1. We went surfing, it was so much fun!
2. In a nice little hotel next to the beach.
3. We took a plane to the island and then we rented a car.
4. We went for 6 days.
5. It was lovely, it only rained once.
6. I went with my Mum, Dad and little brother.

Speaking

Ask the questions to your teacher, then to your partner.

Then write 2 new questions for your partner:

Where Who When What Why How	Did	You	Verb in base form Do Eat Buy See Etc.	There?
What	Was	The best thing	You	Verb in past simple Ate? Saw? Bought? Etc.

Key

Scrambled questions

1. How were your summer holidays?
2. Where did you go?
3. What did you do there?
4. Did you like it?

Question Words

1. What
2. Where
3. How
4. Who
5. How
6. What

Answer Match

1. E
2. B
3. C
4. F
5. D
6. A

Teacher’s Notes

Pronunciation

While students are performing the speaking task, be sure to help them with pronunciation of the questions, focusing specifically on weak forms and sentence stress:

Where did you go?

| weə dɪdjə ɡəʊ | – Connected speech and weak form “you”

What was the weather like?

| ˈwɒt wəz ðə ˈweðə ˈlaɪk | – weak forms of “was” and “the”. Sentence stress on “what” “weather” and “like”

Smartphones, photos

If students have photos of their holiday readily available (on a smartphone or tablet) let them show their partner while they describe their holiday.