This is a set of ESL vocabulary puzzles rather than a typical ESL Brains lesson plan. Each of the puzzles can be used separately as a time filler, a warm-up, etc. Students work with business-related compound nouns, word formation, money vocabulary and idioms. 

ESL VOCABULARY PUZZLES – COMPOUND NOUNS AND WORD FORMATION

The first puzzle is an exercise in compound nouns. Students have to find business-related compound nouns (e.g. workmate, team leader, night shift). The nouns are hidden in fourteen pairs of sentences (e.g. Our sales are going down. We need to find a new person with a better strategy. – salesperson). The second puzzle is all about word formation. Students have to find pairs of words that take the same ending to create different words (e.g. success and stress take the ending -ful to create successful and stressful). There are ten pairs to find among twenty words. After finishing the task, students can give one more example of a word with a given ending.

MONEY VOCABULARY AND IDIOMS

In the third of the ESL vocabulary puzzles, students have to find twelve words related to money (e.g. refund, account, withdraw, budget) hidden within a series of words in the provided sentences. After finishing this activity, students could come up with their own sentences which hide other categories of words. They could also use some words to build similar sentences and find the hidden words in their partner’s sentences. Finally, there is the fourth puzzle which is related to idioms (go the extra mile, see eye to eye with someone, etc.). Students read eight sentences with idioms and find an incorrect word in each of them. Then, they try to correct the sentences. After finishing each of the puzzles, as an extension, students could create sentences with new words, make questions and ask them in pairs, write dialogues, etc.