There is a myriad of Flashcards for sale online and even more uses for them in the classroom but up until recently, I couldn’t find a way to make it enjoyable and functional in my Core French classroom.
When I purchase packages that include Flashcards, I love the effort that creators have put into their cards… but I run out of ideas on how to use them in my short 40 minute classes. Today, I have a handful of fun ways to bring flashcards into your Core French class.
Table of Contents
- Exit cards
- Building sentences
- Practice at centers
- Bang
- Memory
- Go fish
- Bug in a rug
- Guess who
- Spelling Bee
- Whole class competition
- Categories
- Story time
Exit cards
A cool way to use your cards is to use them as a literal entrance or exit exam. When students line up to change their shoes to go outside, or coming back into the classroom from recess, flash a card at them. If they don’t read the word or say the picture correctly, back of the line.
Students can also get involved by including this as one of the classroom “jobs”. Each week, there is a different student that holds the power to send others to the back of the line. They love this.
Building sentences
Placing all cards on the board or a table, students can mix and match articles, verbs, vocabulary, emotions and prepositions, to create their own unique sentences. As long as the sentence makes sense, its a correct sentence.
Practice at centers
A fun game that I learned while supporting ESL students, was throwing the cards in a pile right-side facing down, and they take turns blindly picking a card to read or identify. For each correct recitation, they get a point. Every time someone shouts an answer to a card that isn’t their own, they loose a point. The most points/correct responses, wins.
Bang
Add a few “Bang” cards to the mix, and you have a great centres game where students loose all their cards, or go again depending on the house rules, without teacher assistance. This is basically the same as game #3 but with the added struggle of loosing it all by picking the wrong card.
This works well with older students that won’t be so upset when they pick this loosing card. I did have a student once that only picked Bang cards the entire time we played on a specific day. They were rewarded at the end for being a great team player and keeping their cool.
Memory
Adding two sets of flashcards together and you have a great game of memory that one can play on their own. While matching two pictures of a duck isn’t challenging nor is it learning French, but requiring them to match a picture to the name sans image requires students to read the word and identify what it means to match the cards.
Go fish
Same idea as Memory; placing a deck of images and a deck of words together and have students match words to pictures in order to complete a pair targets their reading, identification and speaking abilities. This can be done in partners or small groups.
Bug in a rug
A new game I learned about this year, is Bug in Rug. In a small group, on a flat surface, spread out the flashcards facing up. Each all students closing their eyes, the group leader will place a counter, slip of paper, or specially designed “Bug”, under one of the cards. Players need to ask “est-ce que c’est sous _______?” (Is it under the___) in order for the leader to respond with yes or no. The player that finds the bug gets to be leader.
Guess who
Verbally as a listening activity or written as a reading comprehension activity, describe the image/word on the flashcard and have students take turns guessing which one you are thinking of. This works great in the animal unit, as well as the seasons when describing clothing, drinking/eating or activity.
Spelling Bee
Dividing the class into two teams, show a flashcard to the speller and they must write the name of it on their board correctly to get the point.
This can be adapted for younger grades or ESL students to simply identifying the image by its French name, no spelling required.
Whole class competition
I love doing this with the higher grades when we are learning Passé Composé. For Core French, I can show an image and they must all write the word correctly on their personal white board, I can show a word and they must raise their hand up first to read the word, or I show an image and they identify it by its French name.
Categories
This requires the mixing of Flashcard decks, but if they do the job right, they will clean it up for you.
Mixing a range of cards on a large surface, divide the class into various teams and give them categories; winter clothes, spring animals, food, etc. Using only written cards (no images) let them loose to collect as many cards in their given category as possible before the buzzer rings. This requires students to read and understand the cards in front of them.
Story time
The last one on the list, for now, is story time. Have a student pick a card and they must create a proper sentence from this card. The next student that picks a card must continue the story using this new word.
This is ideal for a class that has a strong understanding of transition words and have a good imagination.
If you can think of other fun games that can be used with the same deck of flash cards, leave a comment below.
You can find my Spring unit set of flashcards here on TPT. They include articles, verbs, prepositions and vocabulary (images with writing).
Mme B's Classroom 
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