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THE ROLE AND PLACE OF GAMES IN LEARNING LEXICAL MATERIAL
1
Ergashev Muhammadjon Rahmonovich
PhD, Docent at Kokand state university
2
Ziyaboyeva Nazokatxon Abdurashid qizi
Student of Kokand state university, a student of Faculty of Philology,
Department of English Language and Literature
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15636978
ABSTRACT:
The following article illustrates the importance of games in teaching.
Moreover, it show the role of games in learning lexical materials as well as discusses some ways
of teaching with the help of various games.
KEYWORDS:
games, teaching, lexical materials, classroom management, attention
grabber.
Today teaching has changed a lot over the past years. Once it was all about learners being
passive and listening in the classroom, but today learners are usually much more active in the
classroom, and what better way to be active than by playing games. The national curriculum in
foreign languages in Uzbekistan talks about the importance of keeping teaching methods
diverse in order to light and sustain interest among students. Teachers can help sustain
diversity in a variety of ways, for example by using activities that require learners to be creative
in thinking and emphasizing individual learning and cooperative learning equally. A more
specific way that teachers can use in order to keep diversity within the classroom is to not be
afraid of using games as a teaching method along with other methods. According to the national
curriculum games can be a good teaching method and games, such as role playing games,
imitation games, theatrical expression and problem solving activities are especially fitting for
all stages of language learning. Howard Gardner, whose theories that humans have eight
intelligences, claims that when exploring a certain topic in school it can be approached in 6
different ways in order to maximize the chances of reaching all students in the classroom. One
of these ways is “the personal way”, where the ultimate goal is to see if it is possible to approach
a specific topic by using, for example, role play, or other interactions In addition, Armstrong
suggests board games as a teaching strategy that might suit learners with interpersonal
intelligence because they provide an excellent setting for interaction between students. Even
though games are usually started with the aim of having fun, they can sometimes end badly, for
example if someone gets carried away with all the fun and says or does something that hurts
someone else or his feelings. When games are used in the classroom the teacher must keep this
in mind and control the game in the right way. Also he or she must make sure that every
participant has a positive experience because the classroom must not become a place where
students feel vulnerable or picked on in. Another thing that is important to acknowledge is the
fact that not all games fit the classroom environment, or all groups of students, and that it can
be hard finding the right game. In fact, it is good to keep in mind when selecting a game that a
recipe for a good educational game is one that balances both fun and challenge. Another point
teachers need to keep in mind is to choose wisely when it comes to selecting a game to use in
the classroom because; although one game might be perfect for one teacher or a particular
group of learners it can be terrible for another teacher or group of students.
Physical games - an example of a physical game is “Walking the line” where participants
have to walk a line and perform various types of tasks at the same time, for example walking
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backwards, or balancing a book on their heads (Ingvar Sigurgeirsson.. In order to make this
game more fitting in a language classroom the teacher should give the instructions in the target
language, for example “everydiv has to walk backwards”.
1
Another example of a physical
game could be the game “
Simon says
”, where someone plays Simon and gives the others orders,
for example “
Simon says jump
” or “
Simon says clap your hands
”. I categorize this game as a
physical game because of the fact that the
Simon’s orders
are usually physical. Activities like
“Simon says” fits into a teaching method called Total Physical Response (TPR) in which
languages is taught by allowing students to observe and take their time to understand the
language before having to speak it. TPR is thought to be a good teaching method for learning a
foreign language for two reasons. The first one is that it is thought to reduce the stress level of
learning a language and therefore making the learning more enjoyable, and the second one is
that it resembles the learning of children’s native language, where children are exposed to the
language for many months before starting to talk. Scavenger hunt games - savage hunt games
are especially fitting in the language classroom because the clues can be written in the target
language, which forces the participants to read and fellow team members to listen and test their
understanding. Also within the scavenger hunt could be puzzles, which the students would have
to solve, such as crossword puzzles, word searches and questions. The possibilities are almost
endless and teachers are only bound by the limits of their own creativity. Educational games -
the “mail game” where participants have to deliver “mail” and make sure it gets to the right
places works as an excellent example of an educational game. For languages a good idea would
be to work around a theme of a certain place, such as the home. The first thing the teacher has
to do is to make the envelopes and the “mail”. The envelopes should be labeled with a specific
genre, which in this example would be “kitchen”, “bedroom”, “bathroom” etc. The mail should
then be letters with words on them that fit into specific envelopes, for example the word “knife”
or the word “refrigerator” would match the envelope labeled “kitchen”. Each student should
then get a certain amount of “mail” that he has to write his name on and then get to work
delivering. The first one to deliver all of his mail would win if it turned out he delivered
correctly. Theoretical expression games - the game “who am I?” fits perfectly into the
theoretical expression category. In this game the class is usually divided into two teams and
then one by one students stand in front of the whole class and act out a specific profession,
which the teacher has given them. The teams take turns in guessing or asking questions, but the
actor can only reply to questions by answering yes or no. The scoring can then be managed in
a way that one point would be given to a team that asks a question, which is replayed with a yes
answer and 5 points would be given to the team that figures out who the actor is playing.
Drawing- and coloring games - an example of a game from the category: drawingand coloring
games can be a game called “drawing in a foreign language”. That game is very similar to the
“who am I” game from the category above but the only difference is that the students have to
draw on the blackboard instead of acting, and they could be working with other types of
vocabulary than professions, for example nouns, verbs or adjectives. Educational card games -
one educational card game is Bingo, which is an excellent activity to use in language teaching
1
Serova T.S., Chainikova G.R. System of exercises for the development of lexical competence: article. - M .:
Professional education, 2013. - c 92-93.
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because the teacher can draw words and the students only have pictures on their bingo cards
or vice versa. That way the students have to understand the words to be able to match it to the
right picture. Word games - word games can be especially good for language teaching. Included
here are crossword puzzles and word searches where students get the words in their native
tongue but they are hidden in the word search and only match the crossword puzzle in the
target language. Also it is easy asking students to use the target language in the game “Filling in
a chart” where participants have to find, for example a country, a city, an animal, or a type of
food. Story games - an excellent example of a game from the category: story games, is the game
“to tell a story”.
2
The participants sit in a circle and one of them gets the role of the story teller.
The teacher whispers one word into the ear of each student and asks him or her to remember
it. Then the storyteller begins telling a story and every now and then he stops and points at a
student who then has to say the word the teacher has whispered to him. The storyteller then
has to incorporate this word into the story, and that usually has amusing consequences. This
game fits into language teaching perfectly because the story would be told in the target
language and the words would also be in the target language. Question games - a good game in
the category: question games, is the game “riddles about European countries”.
3
The students
get divided into pairs and each pair gets assigned a specific country and the task of preparing a
small riddle about it, such as “It has many horses, it is surrounded by sea, and there you cannot
travel by train” Answer: Iceland After each pair has made their riddle they would be asked to
come to the front of the class and ask the other pairs to solve the riddle. The other pairs then
have to write down what they think the right answer is and when all pairs have asked their
riddles all the answers are collected and the pair with the most correct answers wins.
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