What not to Wear?

Teaching a unit on clothing is one of the best opportunities to use realia or real objects. One fun way to start class and introduce new vocabulary is by bringing your "shopping bag" and showing students the various articles of clothing you bought.

Shopping Spree

For classrooms with computers students can be put in pairs or small groups and given $100 imaginary dollars which they must spend to create an outfit. Students can chose their online store of choice or all be given the same one ( either way its always in English) and after finishing the task they present their decisions to the class, which later votes on the coolest outfit within the alloted
budget.

What do your clothes say about you? 

 http://www.sixwise.com/newsletters/07/03/14/clothes-psychology-what-your-clothing-tells-others-about-who-you-are-and-who-you-want-to-be.htm

Suitcase Challenge

A short activity you can do is bring in weather related realia (rain boots, scarves, gloves, sandals, sun glasses etc.) and have students pack their suitcase for a trip during a specific season. A way to make a little competetive and get them moving would be to put the clothes around the room and time the students to see who can pack their bag the fastest with the most appropriate clothing.

This video of Mr. Bean is a great way to introduce the activity and get the students laughing.

Reader's Theater: The Emporer's New Clothes

Reader's Theater is a great way to get students involved! Literacy Connection is one of the many websites out there that offer free scripts, stories and activities for student. It is also my personal favorite.


Below is a link to the Emporer's New Clothes text along with some comprehension questions and activities.

http://www.sharlagillard.com/eslgarden/stories/dl/emperors_new_clothes.pdf

Fashion Show

Students have a lot of fun with this activity, even those who are quieter in class. As always, break students into and have them choose their differing roles (scribe, writer, model etc), motivating students who are less likely to participate and keeping more advanced students from dominating the activity and instead serving as team leader or moderator. Together the group must describe what their model is wearing, with a different adjective for each article of clothing. then, after all groups are finished the class holds a mock fashion show along with music and a make-shift catwalk (the aisle between a row of desks is fine). This is not only a fun activity for clothing vocabulary but also a great exercise for the present continuous tense. For example, students may say, "He is wearing a gray sweatshirt".

Halloween Costume Creating

There are also a lot of fun ways to incorporate clothing vocabulary around Halloween. Students can describe their actual costume or an ideal one. Teachers can also provide students with a picture of a Halloween costume that they must describe and later have other students guess.

Here are some links for DIY costume ideas:

http://www.creatingreallyawesomefreethings.com/diy-adult-costumes/

http://www.marthastewart.com/275248/homemade-halloween-costumes-for-adults/@center/276965/halloween

http://blog.couponsherpa.com/50-cheap-and-easy-costumes-for-adults-and-children/