Conditional Story Circle

Setup

Divide the class into groups of four to six students. The students in each group sit in a circle.

Activity

1. One student starts by saying a sentence in the first or second conditional (‘If I win/won the lottery…‘ is always an easy place to start).
2. The next student has to say what happens next as a result. They do this by using the result from the previous sentence as the condition in their sentence.
3. Subsequent students then do the same, forming a story (example below).
4. Repeat for as long as desired. At the end, you could also ask the groups to share a summary of their story with the rest of the class.

– If I won the lottery, I would buy a sports car.
– If I bought a sports car, I would drive really fast.
– If I drove really fast, I would crash.
– If I crashed, I would break my leg.
– If I broke my leg, I would go to the hospital…

Target Language

The Conditional Story Circle ESL activity allows students to practise the first conditional or the second conditional. Due to the nature of the activity, it is designed for intermediate students who have learned the grammar fairly recently (or who need a review), but who are confident enough to produce the grammar orally.

Students who still need to see the structure written down and take more time forming it may benefit from the Conditional Story Chain activity. For another activity which uses the same setup as Conditional Story Circle without the focus on conditionals, see Story Circle.