Picture Postcards

Purpose: A writing activity for intermediate and advanced level students to practice descriptions.

Preparation Time: None, unless you need to collect the postcards first.

Materials: Pens, paper and picture postcards.

Preparation: Go through the postcards and make sure they are appropriate for the learners. Do the learners have enough of the vocabulary they’ll need to describe the pictures? How will you state the purpose of the activity and how will you demonstrate what you want them to do?

Procedure:

1) Give each student a postcard. Each student must look at his or her picture and imagine what it is like to be in that place.

2) On a separate sheet of paper, each person then writes a brief message to a friend, just as they would on a real postcard, describing the place and what they are doing there. If the postcard has a place name on it, tell students they’re not allowed to use the name in their description.

3) Collect the postcards and messages and separate them. Give each postcard a number and each message a letter, but don’t list them in the same order.

4) Distribute the cards around the classroom, placing each one with a message from a different card.

5) Students then walk around the classroom, looking at all the messages and postcards. They must decide which message goes with which postcard, and write them down, e.g. message B and postcard 5.

6) When everyone is finished, check the answers. Talk about how certain answers were decided.