Bingo!

This activity can be adapted for use with any short pieces of audio, especially those that contain lots of topic-specific vocabulary. It takes a bit of preparation, but is always worth the effort.

Who it's for:
All levels

What it's for:
Intensive listening, vocabulary building, making hypotheses

What you need:
Two or more authentic short texts on Spotlight Audio, for example, the interviews from Debate; bingo sheets that you have prepared beforehand

What you do:
Before the lesson, find one or more Spotlight Audio texts that contain vocabulary on a chosen topic. The activity is most worthwhile if you use unscripted original material. From the April audio, you might choose the first two speakers in the Debate about cycling, track 6.

To create the bingo grid, pick out eight words or short phrases from each text that are relevant to the topic, and another few words that are also relevant, but are not mentioned. If you are using the Debate topics, there is usually plenty of topical vocabulary on the left-hand page which is not mentioned by the speakers. Try to find a mixture of nouns, verbs and adjectives. Write or type the words into a grid, then print out enough for your class. If you mix the words up, remember to keep a version for yourself which makes clear which vocabulary item came from which text.

Example vocabulary from the above extracts might include:

Raphael: bike lanes, bikes, bold, difficult relationship, pay attention, sidewalks

Mair: bicycle, kings of the road, look both ways, one-way street, problem, stop signs

Other relevant vocabulary: crowded, healthier lifestyle, motorists, parked car, share, signal

In the lesson, hand out the bingo grids to your students. Tell them that they are going to listen to two people talking about cycling in Montreal (or whatever other topic you have chosen) and then give them a minute or two to choose six words from the grid to make up their own personal bingo card. You could of course make your own blank bingo cards to which students to transfer their choices, but if they highlight / circle the chosen words on the grid it works just as well.

If you do the activity regularly, then students will know that they are not going to hear all of the words; they choose words that they think they will hear. The first time, however, the students assume that they will hear all the words. Either way, who hears all their words first is a matter of luck.

Tell the students to cross off the words as they hear them. The first person to hear all their words should shout "Bingo!" Play the recordings.

If you are lucky, one of your students will indeed shout "Bingo!" This doesn't necessarily mean, however, that he or she has really heard the words. For this reason, detailed feedback is an important part of the activity, and it's what will improve their listening skills.

Listen to each text again as a group, establishing when each of the words arises. At some point you will have to confess that some of the words were not used at all. In any case, it is important to point out how easy it is to think that you have heard something when you haven't, and to raise awareness of the features of spoken English that may lead to confusion.

You may want to play the recordings again and hand out the transcripts to check as a group. A useful final activity is to ask the students to recreate the text of each extract to the extent possible, using the grid of words to help them.

Clearly, the words that you pick out for the bingo grid will depend on the level of the group. A simpler version of the activity would contain only words that are used in the extracts.