Teaching Vocabularly; Categorisation Games
Planning learning activities around the concept of ‘categorisation’ is a great way for children to learn and develop their vocabulary in the early primary years. I love the idea of fun and purposeful games in the classroom. It also builds on both leadership and the ever so painful teamwork skills.
Some ideas include:
Students are given a minute and a category then in teams they must write down or draw as many things that come under that category as they can think of
Have a set of pictures for each category jumbled up, and students must separate the pictures into all the different categories.
Show a picture and students must guess what category it is from
Have a set of pictures for each category that must be sorted correctly. Include a time limit if you like
Students must select from five pictures which one does not belong to that category
A student picks a category from a bag and is given 30 seconds to recite as many things as they can from that category
The teacher picks a category and then gives clues so children may guess what they are thinking of. For example, if the category is animals the teacher may say an ‘animal that eats grass and gives milk’ as a clue for a cow
Place pictures on the table and each child has a turn at picking up all the related pictures within 45 seconds
Sort a group of objects by one feature
Show a group of pictures to students, and they must identify which category they are from and how they know
Categories you may like to start with for sorting. Please feel free to add to the list.
Clothing – colour, sex, buttons, hard, soft, size, where worn, season, made of...
Family – sex, hair, children, adults, age...
Around the House – room, size, hard, colour, soft, electricity...
Birds – colour, beak, size, predators, water birds, fly or not...
Fruit – shape, colour, size, shiny, soft, sweet/sour, skin, how it grows, time of year grown...
Houses – shape, colour, size, chimney, verandah...
Transport – wheels, size, land/sea/sky, motor, work/pleasure...
Vegetables – shape, colour, size, when eaten, cooked, skin, leafy, where grown...
Farm Animals – number of legs, colour, tail, size, how it moves, where it lives, species...
Shoes – colour, laces, size, purpose, time of day, made of...
Sports – hat, ball, bat, team, contact sport...
Occupations – sex, hat, active, entertainer, service, inside, sports...
Plants – flowers, main colour, trunk, stem, size, spiky, fruit...
Do you have any other ideas for helping our students develop their vocabulary through the concept of categorisation? Feel free to share what has worked with you in our comments section below