How I Use Thematic Units to Teach Elementary ESL Students

 Teaching English Language Learners in elementary school can  feel overwhelming to plan meaningful, language-rich lessons every week. That’s exactly why I use thematic units in my classroom with all you need to write your lesson plan.

 You can explore the 10 thematic units here:   https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Elementary-ESL-Teaching-Units-EXPLORE-Bundle-10-Thematic-Units-14383276

My Elementary ESL Teaching Units- EXPLORE- Bundle, which includes 10 ready-to-use with minimal prep thematic units are designed specifically for elementary-age ELLs (typically grades 2–5).  These units are: transportation, town,farm, beach, routine verbs, weather, seasons, time,community helpers, adjectives.

This Bundle Supports Mixed Ability Levels. In one class, you might have newcomers alongside students who are ready for richer tasks. Thematic units allow you to differentiate easily—with visual supports, simple worksheets, and extension activities all in one place.

 Each unit includes:

Flashcards vocabulary cards for visuals and frequent review to introduce vocabulary. They are included in every unit to give students clear visual support, and make language practice interactive, hands-on, and easy to reuse throughout the lesson.

Transportation unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2024/12/transportation-flashcards-for.html

Small cards are included in each unit for hands-on practice, games, sorting, and sentence-building activities that encourage active student participation.

 town unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/03/town-small-cards-for-elementary-esl.html

Cutouts are included to promote hands-on learning through matching, sorting, and interactive language activities. Adjectives blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/06/adjectives-craft-stick-puppets-sorting.html

Worksheets help students reinforce vocabulary and language structures through guided, independent practice and review. Farm Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/04/hands-on-farm-vocabulary-activities.html

Engaging games for production in group or partner interaction.They are important in this resource because they keep students motivated while providing meaningful, repeated practice of language skills in a low-stress, engaging way.

Beach Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/05/beach-unit-games.html

Spelling activities are important because they help students connect sounds to letters, reinforce vocabulary, and build confidence in reading and writing English words.

Seasons Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2020/03/seasons-and-nature.html

Printable books to support thematic literacy. They give students a meaningful way to practice reading, vocabulary, and sentence structure while creating a take-home product they feel proud of. 

Transportation Unit Blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/02/transportation-layered-book-for.html

Holidays: Christmas.  The bundle includes themed units for popular holidays, helping students practice language through familiar, engaging celebrations and seasonal vocabulary.

Weather Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/12/christmas-snowglobes-numbers-120.html

Use the unit materials in centers where students can practice vocabulary through:

Matching games.  Telling the time blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2019/04/telling-time-for-esl-learners.html

Memory cards. Community helpers Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/07/community-helpers-jobs-and-occupations.html

Sentence Association. Routine Verbs unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/07/routine-verbs-small-cards-for-eslefl.html

Students rotate through activities.

There are add ons:

Activities focusing on numbers 1–20 help students develop counting skills, number recognition, and number vocabulary through visual, hands-on, and engaging practice that supports early math and language development. Farm Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/10/counting-120-cows-numbers-activities.html

Prepositions of location is also found in several units. It will help students understand how objects relate to each other in space (in, on, under, next to, etc.) through visual and hands-on practice. This is especially important for ELLs, as prepositions are challenging to learn and are best taught in context, supporting clearer sentence building, better comprehension, and more confident oral language use.

Beach Unit blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/09/beach-prepositions-activities-with.html

Finally, Teaching tips to make planning easier and more effective. The 3ps lesson plans are ready to follow.

Follow me on Instagram for creative activities, classroom tips, and exclusive sneak peeks of my teaching resources! There Hands-on games and activities for young learners, freebies and more:   https://www.instagram.com/rosamelia_eslteacher/

Halloween Colors Activities for Elementary ESL | Flashcards, Games, Worksheets & Puzzle

 This resource is also included here: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Colors-Unit-for-Elementary-ELL-Starters-3629423

Instead of learning colors in isolation, students connect them to Halloween. It builds cultural understanding alongside vocabulary.

 Draw the grid on the board and place the Halloween characters flashcards in each box. Call out “A2!

Students: It’s the witch!
Teacher: Yes! What color is the witch?
Students: green! She’s a green witch.

Draw the color splotches on the board and have the students start sorting according to color. Ask questions: What is brown?

Students: the tree, the coffin, the Werewolf.

Place any flashcard in a clear plastic sheet. Using a whiteboard marker students write sentences about the image.

Spin the bottle using the small cards. Students will sit in a circle with a plastic bottle in the middle. Display the cards in a line in front of the children. One of them can spin the bottle and the others wait until it stops. The bottle is pointing to a student and has to pick a card say what it is or a sentence. 

The small cards work well for short paragraph writing.

Play match the word to the picture, juts cut the word out of each card.

Go upstairs with the small cards. Place clear masking tape on the ladder part of the card and hand in to an individual child or group along a dry erase marker. Cut the words from the small cards and students arrange them into a pile. When the student recognizes a Halloween card correctly he checks a space on the stair. The first one to make it to the top wins.

Halloween Coloring Worksheets. Each worksheet has Halloween characters and objects for students to color according to the color word provided.

Color Recognition Practice. Students identify the color word (orange, green, black, purple, etc.) and color the picture correctly.

As an extension students make simple sentences after coloring: “The tombstone is gray. ”The ghosts are yellow, black, red, purple, brown, white, orange, blue, green, and pink.

Students will strengthen color vocabulary in context in this worksheet.

Another benefit is that the worksheets give students a clear visual connection between the written color word and the object, helping them build stronger word recognition skills.

 

Puzzle Match & Say.  Students take turns picking a piece (picture or word). They find the matching piece and say the full phrase: “Purple haunted house.”

I added letter tiles with Halloween features to make crosswords of the color words

or to write the Halloween words.

There is the Thanksgiving version included in this resource:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/10/thanksgiving-colors-activities-for.html

All my blogs and social media in one link:

https://linktr.ee/HolisticEnglishResources

Fun Classroom Games to Teach Emotions to Elementary ELLs

 This resource ( printable emotions vocabulary game ELL )can be found here: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Emotions-Unit-for-Elementary-EFL-2023631

Games give students repeated exposure to the target vocabulary (happy, sad, angry, etc.) in a way that feels natural and engaging instead of repetitive drills. Many games require students to talk, listen, and respond. This encourages oral language development and gives them confidence in using English naturally.

ESL emotions board game activity.  Since the board game path has only emotion words, students need to match to emotion cards to stay in their spot.   Students roll the die and move along the path. If they land on “angry,” they must find the matching angry picture card. If correct, they stay; if not, they move back one space.

This Emotions Vocabulary Domino Game is designed to build vocabulary, practice reading, and make connections between words and pictures. Students match emotion words like happy, sad, angry, scared, worried, shocked, and excited with their corresponding *emotion picture cards.

Playing the Guess Who? Emotions Classroom Game/ Yes/No Questions.

To play the Guess Who game, teachers should prepare a display for each student. A simple way is to cut the front panel from a cereal box and use the side flaps to staple or tape it so it stands upright. Then, glue the printable part  on the front of the display. Each student will have their own standing display to use during the game.

 One student chooses a card with an emotion. The other students take turns asking yes/no questions:
“Is she happy?” → “No.”
“Is he angry?” → “Yes!”

Build the Emotion Words with printable letter tiles. Give students a pile of mixed letter tiles. Call out or show a picture of an emotion (e.g., happy) using the wheel. Students race to build the word with their tiles.

Guess the Missing Letter. Teacher shows an emotion word with missing letters (e.g., s___oc___e____). Students use tiles to fill in the blanks and find the small card to match.

Check the flashcards added to this resource:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/08/emotions-adjectives-flashcards-to.html

Find creative resources and engaging activities to make learning English fun for your students. Follow me on Instagram for teaching tips, freebies, and more!

Follow me at @rosamelia_eslteacher for:

•       Fun, thematic ESL resources 📝

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•       Sneak peeks of upcoming materials and tips for ELLs 🔑Let’s connect and make language learning exciting and interactive for our students! 🚀

I used the alphabet from Creative Fabrica, check my affliate link:    https://www.creativefabrica.com/product/groovy-smile-doodle-alphabet/ref/2670802/?sharedfrom=pdp

Beach Unit Games

  This resource ( Beach Unit Games — Printable Beach Vocabulary & English Activities for Elementary ELL) is included in Beach Unit for Elementary at this link, ready to download:

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Beach-Unit-for-Elementary-ESL-4075972

The games are ideal for children beginner ESL,mixed classrooms. With this Beach Unit Games Pack, you get a variety of interactive games that reinforce vocabulary, spelling, reading, speaking, and creativity — all built around a beach theme. Great for summer lessons, thematic units, or just a fun review class.

Print the beach-themed board game and play with a twist. Each time they land on an item, they "collect" it in an imaginary beach template that has been assigned to each player.
At the end, they list or draw the things in their beach and describe them: “I have a towel and sunglasses.”

Spelling Activities Matter: Learners internalize the correct spelling of new beach-related words (e.g., bucket, mask) by physically constructing them.

Develop early reading and vocabulary skills with this picture-word matching card game. Students will match beach-themed word cards (e.g., sandcastle) with corresponding picture cards to build vocabulary recognition, strengthen spelling awareness, and support reading fluency.

The cards are ready for print & cut; suitable for pair work, small groups, or whole-class games.

Students will review and reinforce their beach vocabulary by writing words on their own Bingo boards and listening carefully during a picture-word calling game using the cards from the previous activity.

The blank Bingo boards provided are for students to write in 8 beach-themed words. Prepare a master list of the words you want to use. As each word is called, students check their boards. If they have the word, they cover it with a token. The first student to cover all 8 words and call out “BINGO!” wins. You can keep playing any other day, they just save the board that is already prepared.

 Matching Words. Lay out the picture cards on one side of the table and the word cards on the other. Students take turns matching the correct word to each image.

Animals on the Beach – Sentence Building Game. Students will use a variety of animal-on-the-beach picture cards to create complete and meaningful sentences using a variety of word cards (nouns, verbs, adjectives, prepositions, and more).

Students will write their sentences on their notebooks and share to the class or a partner. The teacher or peers can help check for grammar and sentence structure.

After using these beach games your students will:

• Know and recall 15–25 beach-related vocabulary words (objects, items, beach items)

• Improve spelling, reading, and word–picture association

• Gain confidence speaking and writing simple sentences about familiar contexts (“I have…, I see…, I build…”)

• Practice listening comprehension (during Bingo or teacher calls)

• Develop creativity through storytelling or drawings — combining vocabulary, grammar and imagination

What You Get with the Printable Beach Book: Full-colour version of “The Frog Is Going to the Beach” — illustrated story for kids.Printable colouring version — useful for colouring, drawing, and integrating art + language.Simple, repetitive, and student-friendly language — ideal for elementary-grade ELLs.Flexibility — story can be used in many ways: echo reading, shared reading, reading comprehension, vocabulary introduction, listening & speaking activities. Included in the complete resource. Go to this blog post:   https://eflelementaryresources.blogspot.com/2025/05/beach-unit-printable-book.html 

All my interactive games, worksheets, and creative ideas to make learning English exciting! 📌 Follow my Pinterest boards and save time and bring fun learning into your classroom! https://www.pinterest.com/ei98srl