These ocean and river animal top trump cards provide several different learning opportunities.
It’s super easy to adapt to different age groups and levels. You can choose:
1. The amount of support you want to include: with a comparative prompt or an adjective prompt.
2. The number of qualities you want your students to compare: 3 or 6
3. The type of activities you want to conduct: print and play, matching pictures to text, creating and writing new Top Trump cards
Whichever option(s) you choose, you will end up with between 8 to 16 colourful animal cards that you can use in a variety of games.
What makes these cards perfect for EFL/ESL kids?
The concept of the game of Top Trumps is familiar to a lot of children. Comparing and winning and losing cards is something that is also present in popular card collections such as Pokemon or football cards.
BUT setting up the activity in the classroom to practice language can be tricky. In my experience, other top trumps cards have the quality, e.g., ‘strength’ and a number. If you want to practise comparative or superlative forms, the learners have to transform this noun into an adjective then put it into a comparative or superlative structure. This is no easy feat for low level learners and they can get frustrated or simply avoid practising the target language.
These cards let you give your learners the support they need. Choose an adjective prompt or a comparative prompt set, so that if the child needs it, they can read it from the card. This way they get more exposure to the structures and are more likely to learn this language.
You can also vary the activity type depending on the skills and language you want to practise. For example, the Picture Match cards can be used to practise literacy skills if you have the students read the name of the animal and match the picture. You can also use them to match sounds to the words. Show the children a picture of the animal, say the word and have them find the corresponding card.
For higher level groups, you might want to get them doing a bit of research. They might disagree with some of the assigned points. Create research projects to investigate the animals and practise discussion and negotiation language to adjust the assigned points.
You could incorporate all the Animal Top Trump sets across the academic year. Each month, the children can add a new animal set to their collection. Tie in with an environmental project each month, focusing on the landscape for that group of animals.