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Sentence Dominoes

March 4, 2012

Deb Abshier, you're amazing! This idea comes from Deb, via Diana Painter at Friday's TPRS gathering, via Michele Whaley's blog post since I once again mixed up dates and didn't attend...this is now the fifth time that this has happened to me since Ellis was born!! Ahh!! Anyway, this is another great P.A.T. type activity that can be used when you and your students need a break from learning new terms and just want to play around with language that you already have. 

Attached is a two-page set of dominoes (the first two pages are in Spanish and the second two pages are in English so that they can be understood and edited by other language teachers. 

Cut out the domino pieces and laminate them so that they can be re-used easily, then give the set to a pair of students to play. In order to lay down a new piece, students must be able to create a sentence that includes the words in any of the boxes that are touching: they could place "ellos" next to "al béisbol" if they come up with a sentence like "ellos juegan al béisbol en el parque". They could lay down a new piece on the center line of another piece (like in the real game, when you have a double piece (with two of the same number) and you can lay another piece perpendicular to it in the middle...like in this picture) by piecing together all three terms, like "Yo tengo que ir al baño / ahora". You should have students record the sentences that they created so that you have a record of their awesomeness...and for accountability. They could also choose one of the sentences and use it as the first sentence of a Free Write. I made the sets by writing sentences and splitting them into four parts: subject/verb/detail/detail. If you make any sets of your own, please share! I'd love to have several different sets laminated that my students can work with. Sentence dominoes

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