Dinner Party Guests

You’re having a dinner party. There’s lots to think about - what kind of music you’ll be playing, how much food to buy, what to drink, etc. But the most important thing, who should you invite to your dinner party?

But this is a dinner party with a difference; you can invite anyone you like to your dinner party. Anyone alive or dead! Who from history would you invite as guests to your dinner party and why?

Queen Victoria, Napoleon, Nostradamus, Gandhi, Marilyn Monroe, Lincoln….anybody you like! What would you talk to your dinner guests about? Why would would you like to have the dinner guests you’ve chosen?

Using this warm-up activity in class

There are many warm-up activities for adults and this is one of the easiest adult warmers to set-up. The best thing about this adult warm-up ESL activity is that you don’t need any materials to get going and this warm-up activity will get lots of speaking from your ESL adults, discussion and disagreement. This ESL warmer for adults could easily turn into a surprise longer activity for ESL adults.

As a lead-in to this warm-up activity for adults, ask a few of your students if they could meet anyone from history, who would they choose and why. Get some ideas and elicit some discussion.

Now tell everyone that you’re having a dinner party and that, you’d like to invite some guests. Write five names on the board about who would you invite and let your teen and adult students ask you questions about who these people are and why you’ve invited them.

Your students now make their own Dinner Party Guests List

Let your students write their own fantasy list of five dinner party guests. Once they’ve done, have your students mingle and wander around the class telling each other about their dinner party guests and why they were chosen.

Once the general noise and interaction in the class starts to die down, then you’ll know it’s time to switch gears for this adults warm-up activity and get people to sit down. Ask your students to tell you their list and also to introduce some dinner party guests of other classmates.

This adults warmer needs no special prep and you’ll get a lot of speaking and listening practice from this warm-up activity for adults.