Rooms of the house for Elementary English Teachers

 This resource (Rooms of the House ESL Activities for Elementary ELLs (Flashcards + Speaking Ideas) is included in the House Unit available here: 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Rooms-of-the-House-Unit-for-Elementary-ELL-10395114

Useful for the English as a Second Language Specialist.

Using this resource with your students they will be able to understand and produce in an oral form the parts of the house using the simple present (grammar). They will learn to ask questions and use the preposition of place with the family members.

This Rooms of the House resource is part of a complete House Unit designed for elementary English language learners. In this first post of the series, you will find practical classroom ideas to introduce house vocabulary, practice speaking, and begin using prepositions of place with family members. These activities are ideal for ESL/EFL classrooms, newcomers, and early elementary learners.

Introduce Rooms of the House Vocabulary

Place the house flashcard in the middle of the board. Teach the new word of the unit creating a mind map.

Start adding the rooms of the house for your students to repeat.

Teacher: This is the bathroom!

Students: bathroom!

Students can look, point to each room of the house and say each word: bedroom!

Talk about the color of the rooms. Teacher: What color is the bathroom?

Students: blue!

Teacher: What color is the bathroom in your house?

Students: It’s gray!

Favorite Room Survey Activity

By now, the students should be able to identify and name the parts of the house. They can say which one is their favorite room in the house.

Teacher: What’s your favorite room in the house?

Student 1: The bathroom.

Tally the answers and draw conclusions of the results with your class.

Teacher: What was the favorite room in the house?

Student 1: the dining room.

Family Members in the House (Prepositions Practice)

Make connections with prior knowledge.The Family Members are in the house.Use gestures when modeling prepositions.

 Students will be able to state where the family members are. It is a good moment to revise the family members vocabulary. Make an emphasis to the phrase in the (room)
Stick the flashcards on the board and an arrow to a room and say a sentence: Mother is in the bathroom.
Elicit who they see and where they are. Review the pronouns he and she.
Ask questions: Where is father?
Students: He is in the living room.

Listening Placement Activity

Place only the rooms of the house flashcards on the board and hand in a family member to seven students. They have to listen to your sentences to where they to put them.Encourage full sentence responses.

Teacher: Father is in the living room.

Then, ask questions: Where is grandpa?

Students: He’s in the kitchen.

Teacher: Is grandma in the bathroom?

Students: yes, she is.

Teacher: Is the baby in the garden?

Students: No, he isn’t.

Guessing Game for Speaking Practice

Review the key language by Playing this guessing game.  Place a family member with an arrow that goes to a room of a house, but cover the flashcard of the family member or put in backwards. Have students ask yes/no questions: Is mother in the garden?

Teacher: NO! Guess again!

Students: Is sister in the garden?

Teacher: yes!! Uncover the family member.

Continue with more.

Classroom Movement Activity

Display the rooms of the house flashcards in different parts of the classroom. Select 6 students to go to one of the them: Pedro, go to the kitchen!

When all the students are at a room ask questions: Lily, where are you?
Lily: I am in the living room.

Talk about your house. Present there is and there are for this activity. Try to create a house map and place several bedrooms and bathrooms. Teacher: There are 3 bedrooms and two bathrooms in the house. There is a living room, a dining room and a kitchen.
Ask negative questions: Are there four kitchens?
Students: NO! There aren’t four kitchens. There is one.
Have several students come and place the flashcards to represent their home.

There Is / There Are House Description

I have checked several text books and I haven’t seen the parts of the house in the scope and sequence. But I will include the flashcards in the resource. Just make a simple mind map to introduce the new words: roof, door, chimney, window using the  flashcards.

Parts of the House Extension Activities

The sorting activities with house parts provide an excellent extension to vocabulary learning by encouraging categorization, observation, and descriptive language.

There is a set of several houses with different colors and with roofs, chimneys, doors and windows in different color condition. Have your students do sorting on the board or on the table the different parts of the house. Students can sort by color the chimney.

It can also be the doors.

Try with the Windows.

Hope you print your flashcards and provide your students with games and activities for practising the new vocabulary.

Students review rooms of the house vocabulary while interacting with St. Patrick’s Day.  Go to this blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/03/st-patricks-day-and-house-unit.html 

Go to my Instagram account: https://www.instagram.com/rosamelia_eslteacher/