Flashcards – Fichas

GAMES GUIDE

GAMES GUIDE

We’ve designed flashcards and memory games using illustrations that can be visualised from an early age. We’ve included contrasting colours, recurring motifs, and solid shapes in our bilingual resources for children in order to captivate your little ones. Furthermore, we want you to enjoy and make the most of our materials at any age, so we’ve designed them in a way that allows maximum flexibility. We can’t think of a better way to acquire a second language than through play! And for a bit of extra help and inspiration, we’ve written down some ideas on how to use our materials…

STORIES, RHYMES AND SONGS

Let your imagination run wild and make up stories, rhymes or songs including one or more of our memory or flashcards. Encourage your kids to help you tell the story, find rhymes, and sing along with you. The repetition will be great to help them remember the items on the cards.

HELLO & HOLA

To play this game select some of the cards and put them up around the room. Go up to one of the cards and “greet” the object on it, for example: “Hello cross”, “Good morning red postbox” or “Good afternoon Big Ben”. Get your kids to follow your lead and greet them after you. Once they can comfortably identify the different items, intentionally make some mistakes and greet the wrong object so that they correct you! If they don’t correct you, “realise” you’ve made a mistake and say something like: “oh no, that’s not the cross, it’s the square! Whoops!”

REMEMBER REMEMBER

This game is more appropriate for slightly older children, aged around 3 or 4. Arrange a few cards face-up on a table or tray so that everyone can see them. Name the items that appear on each card and get the children to repeat after you. Do this two or three times, then get them to close their eyes while you take a card away. Ask them to name the item on the card that has been removed. You can repeat this replacing the card and taking another away, or without replacing it and until all the cards are removed.

SIMON SAYS

Simon says is a simple game where players must follow instructions when the leader starts a sentence with “Simon says…”. However, players must stay still if the leader gives instructions without saying “Simon Says” first. So, for example, if the leader says: “Simon says – touch your nose” you must touch it, but if the leader only says “touch your nose” you must not touch it. For our game of “Simon says”, choose some of the memory or flashcards and place them around the room where you are playing. Make up instructions for your kids to follow, for example: “Simon says – find the orange marmalade” or “Simon says – point to the five taxis”, and make sure they follow your instructions. You can decide to be more or less strict and allow them to continue playing or sit out if they make a mistake.

WHO HAS…?

To play this game you will have to ask the children questions, so they may need to be a little bit older. Go through a few or all of the cards, reading the object on it and encouraging them to repeat after you. Share the cards out to all the players, then ask: “Who has…?” until you have named all the cards.

You can vary this game slightly to incorporate “Simon says”, so instead of asking “Who has the red post box” for example, you could say “Simon says stand up if you have the red post box”.