Guess the Place

活动目的

A quick and simple yet fun game to practice place names (countries, capitals) and talking about the different characteristics and features of these places.

A classroom bell

A classroom bell (office bell / counter bell, see image at right)
A sheet of paper with a list of countries and capitals in both Hànzì and pīnyīn.
A pair of scissors or a paper cutter to slice this list into small slips with one place name each.
Selection of blocks, plastic coins, monopoly money, stickers or some other kind of token reward.

Shuffle the slips of paper face down so that they are in random order.
Students take turns taking a slip of paper but do not reveal what is written on it (teacher can demonstrate by being first to pick a slip).
Other students ask questions of the student whose turn it is to try and determine what place is on their paper.
Example questions:
- 那个地方夏天很热吗？
- 那个地方的人喜欢吃辣的吗？
- 那个地方的官方语言之一是中文吗？
- 那个地方有熊猫吗？
- 那个地方在中国以南吗？
- 那个地方比瑞士小吗？
When a student thinks they may have guessed the answer, they must ring the bell and state their guess. If they are correct, award them a block/coin/bill, and move to the next student to select a slip of paper. If they guess wrong, continue guessing until someone gets the answer (or alternatively, have wrong answers cost one block/coin etc each to make things more competitive).
Note: it may help to first practice countries and then capitals, or to focus on practicing place names from a region studied in the previous class (e.g. Africa, Asia) to keep the number of possibilities limited.