Planning a lesson is no easy task, especially if you're about to introduce a difficult topic. Sometimes, you need a little bit of something extra to really make your lesson flow. For this reason, ESL teachers usually use warmers and fillers. Warmers are used in lessons to ease the students into the topic you're going to present. Along the same lines, fillers are used to reinforce topics or follow up with extra practice for students. BusyTeacher.org has 363 warmer and filler worksheets to make your lesson run smoothly without skipping a beat.
The beauty of using warmers and fillers is that very little planning goes into using them. That’s great because it cuts your planning time by a lot, and also cuts out any awkward downtime in the classroom. These worksheets are helpful when it comes to grammar, vocabulary, writing, or even listening and speaking practice.
These warmer and filler worksheets can be used in several ways. Some can be used as discussion topics to get your students speaking. Some can be used to review grammar topics you have covered in the past. Another great warmer is a writing practice worksheet, which gives students sentences like “This morning I…” and students write down what they did that morning. There are endless possibilities to what you can do in your classroom with these worksheets.
Another great feature of these warmer/filler worksheets is that most can be used for all levels. However, if you need a worksheet for a specific level, the descriptions of all worksheets on BusyTeacher.org show the levels for which they're appropriate . You can even reuse them for your other classes of different levels. Not sure if a certain worksheet is right for your lesson? No problem! Just click on the thumbnail to preview the worksheet and see if it’s right for your class.
Don’t worry about registering or subscribing, since all worksheets on BusyTeacher.org are free to download, and there's no limit to how many you can download! You can use one or two of our worksheets for your lessons every day. All worksheets on BusyTeacher.org were created and submitted by fellow ESL teachers from all over the world. They've been used in classrooms, too - so rest assured that these worksheets are tried and true.
If you have some worksheets of your own that you've found useful in your lessons, why not share them with other ESL teachers to use in their lessons as well? Upload your worksheets to BusyTeacher.org by clicking the link at the bottom of this page titled “Submit a worksheet,” and join the hundreds of thousands of ESL teachers who already use BusyTeacher.org for their lesson planning needs.
Make BusyTeacher.org your number one online resource for worksheets by bookmarking us today. With 363 warmers and fillers, lesson planning will be a breeze. Get started by checking out our most popular warmers and fillers below.
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After reading a narrative passage, such as a story or narrative essay, have students work in groups to create scenes from that reading. They assign the roles, and then perform the scene. They may ...
After students complete a reading, have them “interview” the author. Have them brainstorm some ideas of what they would like to ask the author, such as “When did you first become ...
After introducing to students how to paraphrase and quote, a good follow-up activity is to practice incorporating sources. The teacher should a position related to a current reading on the board: ...
Play the beginning of a popular TV series, such as an episode of the detective series “Monk” or an older series such as the comedy “Friends.” It should be a series with hal ...
At the end of class, have students work together to plan a dinner party of the characters or real people that appeared in their reading that day. Who would they invite? Why? Who should sit next to ...
After introducing the vocabulary of housing and furniture, put students into groups to design their dream houses. One person can “draft” the plan while the whole group contributes to t ...
After reading a story, have students create a “tableau” from that story. A tableau is a “living picture” and is silent. It was a popular party game in Victorian days. Stude ...
A good end-of-class filler is to further discuss an idiom that came up that day: its meaning and origin. For example, an idiom that might come up in class is “under the table,” to disc ...
After teaching students how to quote, have students work in pairs to create imaginary conversations by selecting quotes from their text and then mixing them up with new dialogue they write themsel ...
After introducing a new topic, have students write keywords related to the topic onto sticky notes and organize them in a flow chart on a large poster board. For large classes, students can be bro ...
In the last part of class, have students create “bumper stickers” around a course concept.
First explain what a bumper sticker is (a short, usually clever slogan placed on the back, o ...
Have students get into small groups at the end of class to discuss that session’s reading.
Each group member should offer an opinion on the reading with support for that opinion. One member ...
After students read a well-known story or watch a famous movie, have them rewrite the ending.
For example, if they watch the movie West Side Story, have them consider the possibilities if the her ...
Begin a lesson the day students bring in essays by reviewing the three basic sentence types in English: simple, compound, and complex.
A simple sentence is a subject, verb, and complete i ...
Teachers often bring in elements of popular cultures to lectures for students to relate to. It can work even better if the material is a cultural icon. Not everyone knows who Lady Gaga is, especia ...
After returning student compositions, take some time to review the marks on student papers that they often ignore.
“How many students see ‘R’ on their papers?” the teacher ...
When introducing the concept of argumentation to students, use the example of arguing to a family member for a new car.
The thesis/premise begins the argument: We need a new car. Students then ne ...
Project the ABC on the board, above each letter write the following letters at random:
L for left,
R for right, or
C for clap.
The students have to say the alphabet while they raise ...
At the beginning of a class, especially a conversation/discussion class, beginning by going over the “rules of engagement” or rules for class discussion. After some discussion of guid ...
Students are often unaware of the appropriate way to address faculty and will address their instructors as “Miss Janet,” “Professor Janet,” or even “Lady.” This ...
Students need to learn euphemism, or the “pretty” language used to cover up something taboo within a culture. Begin the discussion asking about this “pretty language,” and ...
After introducing a reading, spend some time going over its idioms and collocations, those formulaic expressions that occur together. The teacher can give the first examples, just by skimming the ...
A good warmer is to look around at the signs that have probably been posted on the walls of the class or its halls and have students consider their meanings. Often students have misconceptions abo ...
Even a simple “hello” can be an occasion for a mini-lesson in an ESL class. The teacher can tell students after they’ve greeted each other that Americans rarely greet each other ...
In groups, students must develop a three-minute TV commercial on the topic of the reading. The TV commercial does not necessarily have to sell something if, for example, the topic under discussion ...
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