Routines ESL Activities and Games | Present Simple, Time, Adverbs of Frequency

 This resource is included here: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Routine-Verbs-for-Elementary-ELL-3088833

Make teaching daily routines fun and interactive with this ESL resource pack for elementary English language learners! Students practice daily routine vocabulary, telling time, present simple sentences, adverbs of frequency, sequence words, speaking, reading, and writing through engaging worksheets, games, sentence strips, matching activities, board games, and hands-on tasks. This resource is perfect for centers, small groups, morning work, homework, and classroom games while helping students build confidence using everyday English.

The flashcard activities in this Daily Routines resource help students practice speaking, reading, listening, and sentence building in a fun and interactive way.

 sentence building activity

 First, the routine verb flashcard is placed on the board. Next, the time flashcard is added, and finally, the part of the day flashcard completes the sentence. For example: He wakes up + at 6:00 + in the morning.

Students learn that we use at with exact times: at 6:00.

They also practice using in the with parts of the day:  in the morning.

There is a flashcard to complete with the hands as needed. The time flashcards used in the examples belong to a complete separate Time Unit resource available in my store. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/The-time-for-Elementary-ESL-EXPLORE-4532035

 
Students grab the flashcards and place them in order on the board to create complete sentences using routine verbs and time expressions.

Activity: Students select a routine verb flashcard, add a time expression, and complete the sentence with a part of the day. After organizing the flashcards, students write the complete sentence on the board.

 adverbs of frequency flashcards: always, usually, and never

By combining the adverb flashcards with routine verb cards, students can easily understand how frequency words are used in everyday English.

 

Students place the routine flashcards under the correct adverb of frequency category such as always, usually, or never. As students organize the flashcards, they talk about their own habits, routines, chores, and free time activities. This helps learners connect grammar with real-life experiences.

Sentence building with the sequencing words before and after.  These words help students describe the order of events in their daily routines using flashcards.

 Routine Timeline Game

Students place flashcards on the board in chronological order from morning to night. Then they add sequence words such as before and after.

This helps students understand sequence and time order.

The small cards provide students with additional practice of the vocabulary and grammar structures that were first introduced with the flashcards.

 Daily Routine Sentence

Place the routine verb flashcards, time cards, adverbs of frequency cards, and sequence word small cards in separate piles. Students grab cards and create a complete sentence.

 

True or False About Me

The teacher will choose small cards to create sentences about herself. Classmates decide if the sentence is true or false.

This activity encourages conversation and personal connections with the vocabulary.

 
Find Someone Who…

The teacher cuts the small cards in half and gives one half to each student. Students walk around the classroom asking questions and searching for the classmate with the matching half card.

This interactive activity encourages speaking.

Writing Activity

Students can create meaningful sentences by choosing cards from different piles and writing about routines, chores, and daily activities.

The teacher places the small cards in separate piles on the desk. Students choose cards to build complete sentences such as “I always ride my scooter in the afternoon.” or “I usually run before I take out the trash.” Then, students write their sentences in their notebooks and share them with the class.

Morning vs Night Sorting

Students can practice sequencing daily routines by placing the small cards in chronological order for each part of the day. Then, they orally describe the sequence using simple sentences and transition words. Students can also compare their routines with classmates and create their own daily schedule conversations.

The worksheets in this resource give students meaningful practice with daily routine vocabulary, telling time, adverbs of frequency, sequence words, and present simple sentences.

 “What Do You Do?” worksheet

Students look at each picture and write the answer in the speech bubble.

“Write the Questions” worksheet

Students read the answer sentence, look at the picture clue, and write the matching question on the line. This activity gives learners meaningful practice with WH- questions, auxiliary verbs, word order, adverbs of frequency, time expressions, and sequence words such as before and after.

This worksheet helps students practice changing negative sentences into affirmative sentences using daily routine vocabulary. Students read each sentence carefully and rewrite it in the affirmative form on the lines provided.

Write and talk about their own daily routines using simple present tense questions and answers. Students read each question carefully and write personal answers about their habits, routines, and activities during the day.

Students use the answers from their “Talk About Your Daily Routines” worksheet to complete a class survey activity. As students share their personal answers aloud, the teacher records the information on the board using tally marks for each question. Together, the class analyzes the results and talks about the most common daily routines in the classroom.

This matching worksheet helps students practice reading. Students read each sentence carefully and draw lines to match the correct sentence to the corresponding picture. This activity is perfect for reinforcing simple present tense, time expressions, and routine actions.

Writing the correct verbs

Students review common routine actions while strengthening spelling.

 

Hands-on cut and paste parts of the day

students use the action pictures from the previous worksheet and sort them according to the correct part of the day. First, students cut out the routine action cards. Then, they glue each picture under the correct category: morning, noon, afternoon, evening, night, or midnight.

 

This worksheet helps students practice adverbs of frequency such as never, usually, and always while reviewing daily routine vocabulary. Students complete each sentence by choosing the correct adverb of frequency according to their personal habits or the teacher’s instructions.

These routine worksheets can be used many times by placing them inside clear plastic sheets or dry-erase sleeves. Students can complete the activities using dry-erase markers and easily wipe the answers away to practice again. This is a great way to save paper, reuse worksheets throughout the school year.

 This sequence words worksheet helps students practice using before and after while talking about daily routines. Students read each sentence carefully and complete the blank with the correct sequence word. The activities encourage learners to think about the order of actions during the day while reinforcing routine vocabulary and sentence structure.

 

Interview worksheet

Students work in pairs and take turns interviewing each other using the question prompts on the clipboard worksheet. They listen carefully to their partner’s answers and write the information on the lines provided.

Draw the Clock Hands

Students look at each sentence and draw the clock hands or arrows to show the correct time for each daily activity.

 

The games in this resource help students practice daily routine vocabulary and grammar in a motivating and hands-on way. Through interactive play, students develop speaking, listening, reading, teamwork, and sentence-building skills while gaining confidence using English in meaningful everyday situations.

Routine Game

The game board includes different colored spaces that match the colors of the question cards. Students roll the dice, move along the path, and pick up a card that matches the color of the space where they land.

Each card contains a question related to daily routines and time. Students must answer the question correctly in order to stay on the space and continue moving toward the finish point. If they cannot answer, they can move back one space or miss a turn depending on the classroom rules.

Routine Sentence Strips
Students read the sentence strips and place them on the correct person doing the action. The house can be enlarged in a printer to make it this big or use the normal size paper for the game. Teachers can also turn this resource into a speaking game by asking students to read the sentence aloud and explain why they placed it in that room. The large printable format makes it perfect for table work, centers, pocket charts, or small group ESL activities.

 

Spinners and Speak

These two printable spinners make sentence building fun. Students spin the daily routine spinner and the sequence word spinner to create original sentences using before and after.

Students spin both spinners, the adverbs of frequency and the verbs. Then, use the results to create complete sentences about routines and habits.

For example: I usually swing.

 

Students spin the verb spinners and the time spinner to create original sentences. The teacher or students can draw the hands on the clocks to create different times before using the spinner. After spinning, students make complete sentences such as: I eat at 7:00.

 

Students spin the action and the part of the day spinners.

For example: I brush my teeth in the morning. The activity also reinforces the use of the preposition in with parts of the day such as in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening, and at night.

 

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Supermarket in Town ESL Activities | Shopping Vocabulary | Packaging Words | Some and Any Games

 This resource is included in Town Flashcards at this Link: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Town-Flashcards-for-the-Elementary-ESL-3713783

Teach supermarket vocabulary in a fun and interactive way with this shopping-themed ESL resource for elementary English language learners! Perfect for centers, small groups, partner work, and whole-class activities!

The flashcards are perfect for speaking activities, sorting games, role-play, pocket charts, and classroom discussions while helping students connect English to real-life situations.

Teach supermarket vocabulary with these colorful flashcards featuring things students can find in a supermarket! Introduce the new vocabulary: He is the worker!

Practice supermarket vocabulary with this sorting activity. Students look at the flashcards and sort the food items by container type such as bottle, carton, can, and container. This hands-on activity helps learners build vocabulary.

Review fruit and vegetable vocabulary by sorting. Students sort the flashcards into categories such as fruit, vegetables, and drinks while practicing reading and identifying the vocabulary words.

“What’s in my cart?” flashcards

Practice supermarket vocabulary with this mind map. The teacher places the cart flashcard in the center of the board and adds food flashcards around it to create a shopping mind map. As the vocabulary is introduced, the teacher models complete sentences such as: “I am buying bread, macaroni, and meat!”

Bring family vocabulary into your supermarket lessons with this location activity. The teacher places family member flashcards around the supermarket vocabulary cards and asks questions such as: “Where is Grandpa?” or “Where is Dad?” Students look at the board and answer using location phrases and complete sentences like: “Grandpa is next to the worker.” or “Dad is at the supermarket.”

Introduce and practice the grammar points some and any with meaningful supermarket vocabulary! In this activity, the teacher creates two columns on the board: “I need some…” and “I don’t need any…” using the supermarket flashcards to model affirmative and negative sentences.

The teacher presents examples such as: “I need some milk.”

Students then take turns choosing flashcards and making their own shopping sentences using some and any. 

Teach there is and there are together with some and any using supermarket vocabulary flashcards! In this activity, the teacher divides the board into affirmative and negative sentences to help students understand how to use these grammar structures in meaningful context.

Using the flashcards, the teacher models sentences such as:

“There is some water.”, “There are some bananas.”, “There isn’t any macaroni.”

Students practice creating their own sentences by looking at the flashcards and deciding if they should use there is, there are, some, or any.

Review money and prices with supermarket vocabulary. In this activity, students look at the supermarket flashcards and practice asking and answering questions about prices using real-life food items. The teacher models questions such as: “How much is the corn?”

Students answer using complete sentences: “The corn is one dollar.”

This activity is perfect for reviewing money. Students can also practice shopping role-play, buying items, and adding prices together for even more meaningful language practice.

I also have a complete money unit with lessons, games, worksheets, and printable activities for teaching money to elementary English language learners, go the blog post here: https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2026/04/us-money-games-for-elementary-esl-math.html

Small cards help learners practice vocabulary in an interactive way while supporting reading, speaking, and visual recognition skills. They are also easy to use for centers, small groups, and classroom games.

Mini Shopping Cart Game

Give each student a few small cards and a paper basket or envelope.

 The teacher says shopping sentences such as:  “Buy some fruit.” “Put two drinks in your basket.”  “I need some vegetables.”
Students choose the correct small cards and place them in their baskets. This activity practices listening, vocabulary, and categorization skills.

Practice speaking and supermarket vocabulary. Students choose any small supermarket cards they want and place them inside their shopping cart envelope. Then, they pull the cards out one by one and say complete sentences about the items they need.

Students practice sentences such as: “I need some corn, crackers, and cookies.” “I need some milk, apples, and yogurt.” “I need some water and cookies.”

Price Match Activity
Practice supermarket vocabulary and money skills. Students write prices for each supermarket item card and then use the printable bills and coins to match the correct amount of money needed to buy each item. This activity helps students practice money recognition and counting coins and bills.

The resource includes printable bills and coin templates to complete the activity.

Build a Supermarket Scene
Students can also use the supermarket shelf template to practice questions and answers with location and prepositions in a meaningful context. After placing the small cards on the shelves, students work with a partner to ask and answer questions about where the items are located.

Students practice sentences such as: “Where are the beans?” “They are on the top shelf.”

This activity is excellent for reviewing prepositions of location while encouraging pair work and communication

The worksheets included in this resource give students meaningful practice with supermarket vocabulary, packaging words, grammar, and speaking skills in a hands-on way.

This matching worksheet is a fun way for elementary English language learners to review supermarket vocabulary while developing word recognition skills. Students trace the lines to match each picture with the correct word. Students can also color the pictures after completing the matching activity to add extra engagement to the lesson.

The worksheet works well as independent practice.

This supermarket worksheet is a great way to review prepositions of location while practicing food and people vocabulary. Students look carefully at the picture and answer questions using complete sentences such as She is at the counter, He is in front of the cart, and It is under the customer. This worksheet can be completed with partners.

This supermarket worksheet helps practice reading comprehension, food vocabulary, and following directions! Students read the sentence carefully, draw the food items inside the shopping cart, and then color the picture.

This activity reviews supermarket vocabulary and packaging words such as a box of macaroni, a bottle of water, a can of carrots, and a container of butter. It also gives students extra practice with the structure There is / There are.

This cut-and-paste supermarket worksheet gives students a time for practicing categorization skills! Students color the supermarket food items, cut them out, and glue them into the correct boxes. They can also create and write their own category names for each section of the worksheet. Students may sort the food into categories such as fruits and vegetables, snacks, drinks and dairy, packing, etc.

Students read the food items, draw and color them on the supermarket shelves, and then use their completed worksheet to describe what is on their shelf. Students love personalizing their own supermarket shelves. After finishing the drawing activity, students can practice speaking by using sentences such as: There is a bottle of water on the shelf.

Students first read the shopping list and decide which items they want to buy. Then, they mark the items on the list and draw them inside the shopping cart. Finally, they can color their food items and describe what is in their cart using complete sentences.

Students can also compare their shopping carts with classmates and ask questions such as: What is in your cart?, Do you have apples?, How many items do you have?

Students will love this creative supermarket craft activity! Students can color the supermarket, decorate the signs and windows, and even create their own supermarket name just like a real store. Then, they cut out the supermarket and glue it onto a toilet paper roll to make it stand independently.

Students can also describe their supermarket using simple sentences such as: This is my supermarket.  

This follow-up supermarket craft activity is a wonderful way for students to practice prepositions of place. After students color and assemble their own supermarkets, they place them together on a table to create a small classroom shopping town.

Students then practice describing the location of their supermarkets using complete sentences such as: Happy Market is between Super Foods and Best Mart.

Practice supermarket packaging vocabulary. Students review common supermarket containers and packaging words such as a can of, a box of, a bottle of, a gallon of, a container of, a loaf of, and a pound of while working with familiar food vocabulary.

Interview activity, students walk around the classroom asking and answering the question: “What is your favorite supermarket?” Students interview their classmates and write the answers on the clipboard worksheet.

Turn your supermarket interview activity into a fun class graphing. After students interview their classmates using the question “What is your favorite supermarket?”, the class can work together to tally and organize the results.

In this follow-up activity, students count the answers from their interview worksheets while the teacher records the tally marks on the board. Students compare the results, identify the most popular supermarket

Students love seeing the class results displayed on the board and talking about their classmates’ favorite supermarkets.

Games also encourage communication, cooperation, and confidence while helping students remember new words and sentence structures more naturally.

Pocket Chart Sentence Building
Build complete supermarket sentences while practicing food vocabulary, packaging words, and grammar structures.

Using the pocket chart, students match the food picture cards with the sentence strips to create sentences such as:  There is some butter.

These cards are also great for morning tubs or  literacy centers.

This second pocket chart activity focuses on practicing the grammar points.  Learners read and create sentences such as:  There isn’t any yogurt.

This activity helps students practice:

⭐ some and any

⭐ affirmative and negative sentences

⭐ there is / there are

⭐ countable and uncountable nouns

Supermarket Bingo

First, students cut and paste the food item cards onto their shopping cart worksheet to create their own personalized bingo board. You can decide how many items students should choose depending on the level of the class. Using 6 or 8 items works very well and keeps the game exciting and manageable for young learners.

After all the shopping carts are ready, the teacher places the calling cards inside a bag or container. One by one, the teacher pulls out a card and reads the item aloud using complete sentences or packaging vocabulary such as “a bottle of water,”.

Students listen carefully and check if the item is on their shopping cart bingo board. As the game continues, students can place counters to the matching pictures on their carts. The first student to complete all the spaces on the shopping cart calls out “Bingo!”

Shopping List Game

This is a partner activity. First, students write the food items they need on their shopping list worksheet. Encourage them to choose several different items from the supermarket vocabulary cards and write them carefully on the lines.

Next, students exchange shopping lists with a partner.

Using the food picture cards, the partner reads the shopping list and places the correct items on the shopping cart template. The cards do not need to be glued, which makes the activity easy to reuse again and again during class.

For even more speaking practice, students can switch partners and play again with a new shopping list. This activity encourages communication, cooperative learning, vocabulary review, and careful listening while keeping students actively engaged throughout the lesson.

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