{"id":46713,"date":"2015-09-14T19:44:24","date_gmt":"2015-09-14T23:44:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fluentu.com\/blog\/?p=46713"},"modified":"2025-02-04T01:25:46","modified_gmt":"2025-02-04T06:25:46","slug":"esl-conditionals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fluentu.com\/blog\/educator-english\/esl-conditionals\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Teach English Conditionals in a Fun Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conditionals are a crucial part of the English language, but teaching them to your ESL students can sometimes be challenging.<\/p>\n

In this guide, learn how to teach conditionals in a fun way in ESL class with a range of tips and activities that can keep your lessons informative and engaging.<\/p>\n

[fluentu-toc skip=3,4]<\/p>\n

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Ideas for Teaching Conditionals in Your ESL Classes<\/h2>\n

Here’s a mix of different ideas that I’ve used successfully in my classes. I’ve gotten good feedback from my students about most of them, and I’ve personally enjoyed using them.<\/p>\n

Use activities that let them speak more and learn the language naturally through experimentation. The following ideas for activities are versatile, can be modified according to what you think would work best for your class and can all be done in groups or pairs.<\/p>\n

1. Make it strange or different<\/h3>\n

Conditional chains are a great warm-up exercise, and you can also expand them if you want. Think of weird\u00a0scenarios to catch your students’ interest from the get-go. Have one student say a condition and a result. Then have the next student take the result from the previous student’s sentence and make a new condition from it, along with a new result.<\/p>\n

For example:<\/p>\n

Teacher: “If pigs could fly…”<\/p>\n

Student A: “If pigs could fly, they would make nests in trees.”<\/p>\n

Student B: “If pigs made nests in trees, the birds would get angry.”<\/p>\n

Student A: “If the birds got angry…”<\/p>\n

2. Make it mysterious<\/h3>\n

Give students 10 (or more) conditions and have them verbally complete the results for each (or vice-versa), but out of order so their partner doesn’t know the conditional that’s being completed. Again, making strange or funny scenarios helps keep their interest. Then, the students’ partners have to guess which condition the others are completing.<\/p>\n

For example:<\/p>\n

Student A: “If this happened, I would cry like a baby.”<\/p>\n

Student B: “Hmm, would you cry like a baby if your favorite team lost?”<\/p>\n

Student A: “No.”<\/p>\n

Student B: “Would you cry like a baby if you failed English?”<\/p>\n

Student A: “Yes.”<\/p>\n

3. Make or use a game<\/h3>\n

If you’re a do-it-yourselfer, then by all means, you can make your own games. But if you’re pressed for time, BusyTeacher.org<\/a> has literally hundreds of games, and many of them are specifically made for practicing conditionals, including this one<\/a>\u00a0for first and second conditionals, and this one<\/a> for third conditionals.<\/p>\n

4. Make them use their imaginations<\/h3>\n

Think of more scenarios and ask questions in a “What would you do if…?” format. They can interview partners, or write answers on papers and guess who would do what.<\/p>\n

5. Make a wish<\/h3>\n

Show pictures of people in different situations. Have students imagine what the people wish or hope. You can also expand this by having them make\u00a0full conditional sentences based on those wishes or hopes.<\/p>\n

6. Make them choose<\/h3>\n

Ask them “Would you rather…?” questions, and then imagine the results if they chose either option. For question ideas, rrrather.com<\/a> has some scenarios with pictures. (Just be warned that some will not be appropriate for classes and a few may even make you question humanity in general.)<\/p>\n

Using Videos and Movies to Teach Conditionals in ESL Classrooms<\/h2>\n

I’m dating myself here, but back when I was in school, the best days were the days when we\u00a0walked into a classroom and saw the cart with the TV and VCR on it. We can keep that spirit alive when teaching conditionals. The main question becomes whether you want to find sources that already have conditionals or make your own.<\/p>\n

Finding sources that already have conditionals<\/h3>\n

This is sometimes a bit trickier, since you have to depend on material that you find “as is.” It may not always have exactly what you’re looking for. Still, here are two good general tips:<\/p>\n