Get your inspiration for a fun ESL weather lesson here!
These are 4 ideas that have been met with enthusiasm in the classroom.
Whether we teach kindergarten or teenagers, we all have needed an ESL weather lesson in our years in the classroom. As someone who has taught multiple weather units I am sharing 4 ESL weather activities that the kids loved.
You will learn about activities for teaching weather that include: weather vocabulary, weather forecasts, different weather conditions, weather flashcards and more.
After learning about all these ESL weather activities you will feel inspired and prepared to teach your kids!
This post is all about ideas for a fun ESL weather lesson that your kids will love.
Fun ESL weather lesson
Weather Forecasts
This ESL weather activity was quite successful in kindergarten. Obviously, it can be adapted to fit older students as well. This ESL weather lesson teaches children to describe the weather today. It’s a great start to learning weather vocabulary and an introduction to weather forecasts. It includes the weather watcher song, which the little ones loved!
Lesson materials needed:
– Window to see outside 🙂
– Some visuals such as print outs of common weather, e.g. sun, clouds, cloud with rain, etc.
– Whiteboard or paper with sentence starters
– Optional: short video of weather watcher song
Weather today
It will take a few times to teach the kids this weather song, but once they know it they usually love it! The “weather watcher” was a popular job. One of the kids, the weather watcher, will go to the window and see what the weather is like while the others sing the weather watcher song. They come back to the group and tell the rest of the class what they saw by answering this question: “What is the weather like?”.
Differentiate
This is where you can adapt to different levels. Use sentence starters written on the board or on paper. E.g. ask the beginners to repeat the sentence: “Today, the weather is…” (sunny, rainy, cloudy, windy). For more advanced students, you can ask them to add connecting words, and share more details. When thinking of the prompts, remember what vocabulary words you are trying to hit.
Repetition
For English language learners, and especially beginner ESL students, repetition is important. This is a great activity to repeat daily. We had a spot on the whiteboard with a weather chart, where we put the visuals of the weather. You can easily add and practice language by adding “Yesterday it was…”, “Today it is…”, and “Tomorrow it will…”.
Weather Report
Preparing and presenting a weather report can be done in many different ways, so adapt to your resources and students’ interests and age. This one could be a squeezed into one lesson, but I highly recommend building your weather unit around it.
This ESL weather lesson is a great opportunity to discuss different weather conditions, or even natural disasters or extreme weather events. Somebody has to report on those too, don’t they? The students can have a lot of fun with this. Many of mine were very excited learning about the wild things nature is capable of and stepping into the role of news reporter. Others preferred to stick to more everyday weather.
Either way, this is a great activity to learn many useful skills. Obviously, there will be a wide range of weather vocabulary, learning to understand weather forecasts, have weather-related conversations and much more. And this is not even considering the team work and presentation skills!
Lesson materials needed:
– Devices for research (and/or books depending on resources available and student age)
– A few short video examples of news reporters (Tip: in a variety of countries and languages. Language connection opportunity! What are similarities and differences? What do they notice in the ones that they don’t understand? Body language, certain visuals?)
– Materials for presentation (this really depends on what you or the students decide, many fun options!)
Disclaimer: For the international weather forecasts I did have to look for it in different languages, because I haven’t been able to find a compilation. This will take a little more preparation but I found it worth it!
Interactive lesson plan
This activity is great when looking for a more interactive lesson plan. Since there are so many skills involved this would be a fantastic one to create over an entire unit. Incorporating language skills, communication and presentation skills, etc.
The end presentation can be done in a variety of ways. They can create a video as news reporters, or role-play, or craft a weather report and present it. We did it in pairs and small groups, so that might influence your choice as well. Have fun with it and get creative!
Weather Vocabulary
This one is great for beginner ESL students, as this activity activates multiple learning areas in the brain. By bringing props that the students can touch, see, play with and talk about using the weather-related vocabulary words. It is an effective way of introducing vocabulary for the first time, or a good hook to share the weather topic of the unit.
Lesson materials needed:
– Collect things for different types of weather (wellies, umbrella, swimsuit, gloves, etc.)
– Weather flashcards (or have them draw it on paper and write the word underneath)
– Writing prompts for middle group (could be written on the whiteboard)
Introducing vocabulary words
You can do this sitting on the carpet in a circle. Start with a big bag with all the items in the middle. Students can take them out one by one, naming them. If this is a hook to introduce the unit topic, you can have them discuss at the end what they all have in common. What might the new unit be about? It’s always fun to hear some of the most random guesses.
If you have matching flashcards, you can show them the new words corresponding with each item and point out the spelling.
Weather flashcards
If you don’t have the weather flashcards or you prefer to have them make it themselves, than the students can each draw an image of the vocabulary words. Go over the spelling together and add that to the cards. If you do have the time, this is a nice personal touch and a great resource, since you’ll be using the cards in future lessons too.
You can find an example of weather flashcards here from teacherspayteachers (which is also a good source for free weather worksheets), or use my flashcards template to create your own.
Weather-related questions
Once you have introduced the vocabulary, get curious! What do they already know about these items? What do they wonder about when they think about weather? Have they used them before, and when? What is their favorite weather type?
As with most ESL lessons, you can prepare some sentence starters or prompts to help form basic or more advanced question structures to encourage them to have conversations together. Everyone has experience with different types of weather, especially if they have traveled as well. This is a great opportunity to discuss some of their personal experiences and preferences and connect with each other.
Differentiate and write
Now they can practice writing and using their newly learned vocabulary in yet another way! This can be differentiated by having a small group working with the teacher, the “middle” group writes sentences using prompts or example sentences, e.g. “When it rains, I wear a raincoat”. Using the names of the items, they can write sentences about what to wear in which weather. The more advanced students can create their own sentences and write about the items and weather. If they are done early they can draw themselves or their family in their favorite weather and outfits and write a description or matching words.
{Related post: 9 Fun ESL Activities For A Great First Day Of School}
Weather Around The World
This ESL weather lesson is such a lovely activity when children come from different countries around the world. In my experience (and research-based), children feel seen when they are shown that their experience and their background matters. They are generally excited to either learn more about where they are from, or share what they already know. Again, a great way to connect with each other! Especially when there is a world map with names or photos of the children pinned to the place they are from, visible on the classroom walls.
Note that it can be a confusing question for TCK’s to choose a location that they’re from. Ask them where they would like their name or picture to go. Maybe one place they have lived in is more fun for them to explore the weather of compared to another?
Lesson materials needed:
– World map
– Paper to draw (or printed images of) weather conditions to stick to the map
– Internet + whiteboard to project on (if unavailable: printed weather forecasts from the places the students want to explore)
– Colored markers for the math extension (optional)
Weather map
First, start with a world map. What is the weather like in…? What place would each of the students like to explore? Preferably, a city or country they are from, have lived before, went on holiday etc., some place they can relate to. It’s much more fun when it’s meaningful to them! Write them down for the next step (and so you can list the matching temperatures if you’re choosing to do the math extension).
Depending on the size of the group and available resources, you can choose to search for the weather conditions of each place together, or have them look it up in small groups or individually.
Then, have them draw the weather on a small piece of paper that will go on the world map. You can add the word (e.g. rainy, sunny, freezing, humid, etc.) underneath in English and the language(s) of the specific location.
Lastly, stick the drawings or printed images of the weather conditions on the world map, possibly with a photo of the student, so they can all see who is connected to which place. Or continue with the math extension.
Weather math extension
Who said an ESL weather lesson can’t include math? Looking at weather maps on Google images, you will find many that show different colors to represent the local temperatures. E.g red is hot and blue is cold. Find an example of a USA weather map in Fahrenheit here.
Collect the degrees in Celsius or Fahrenheit of the places the children chose, and list these temperatures in order from cold to hot. Depending on the age and math levels of the children, you can discuss how to group the temperatures by color (this is where it comes in handy to have multiple countries or cities where temperatures vary greatly). They can color an area of their weather condition image before sticking it on the world map, or just add a piece of paper in the correct color.
Inquire further with questions such as: what is the temperature difference between the coldest and hottest place?
What math questions can they come up with when looking at the weather map they have created? Do they have any wonderings? Get creative with it and enjoy!
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