Days of the Week Lesson Plan

Notes:

Teaching days of the week can be really fun and the song accompanying this lesson really helps the students to learn the words and remember the order of the days.

Lesson Procedure:

Warm Up and Maintenance:

See our "Warm Up & Wrap Up" page.

New Learning and Practice:

1. Teach the days of the week vocab
Start off by looking at a calendar with everyone (an English one, if possible). Have some fun with the calendar first: ask students to point at days such as Christmas and to point out their birthdays. Ask what day their birthdays are on this year and point to the days row at the top of each month. Start to teach / elicit the English words for the days as you discuss their birthdays. Ask what day it is today.

2. Play "Put the days in order"
Before class, prepare some colored rectangles of card and write the days of the week in thick marker pen on each rectangle of card. You’ll be putting students in pairs so make enough sets for each pair. Also, if each day can be written on a different colored card it will help the students to quickly identify each day.

Put your students in pairs and give each pair a set of mixed up cards. By referring to the calendar, have the pairs put the days in order on the floor or table. Then get everyone to touch each card and repeat after you as you chorus the days of the week paying special attention to the fist letter of each word (e.g. "Th" for "Thursday"). Run through a few times, getting faster and faster. Finally, get the pairs to mix up the cards and tell them they are going to race to see which pair can put their cards in order first. Say "Ready, steady, go!" and let the students put the cards in order. The winner pair finished first with the correct order.

Play "Put the days in order"

3. Play "Wall Touch"
Give each pair some Blue-Tak or something to stick the cards on the wall with. Ask everyone to randomly stick the cards all over the walls around the room. Then bring everyone into the middle of the room. Shout out "Monday" and everyone has to race over to a Monday card and touch it. Then "Tuesday" and so on (in the correct order) until you make it through all the week days. Play another round, this time faster!

Play "Wall Touch"

4. Sing "The Days of the Week Song"
Put one set of day cards on the board in the correct order (or use our song poster). Run through the gestures (see above) first. Then play the song and sing along doing the gestures. If this is the first time to sing the song, play it a second time.

Lyrics for "The Days of the Week Song"

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
What day is it today?
What day is it today?

Sing "The Days of the Week Song"

(download MP3 here)

Gestures for "The Days of the Week Song"

Some simple actions can be used with this song:

Stand up with both hands straight up in the air.
As the song plays each of the day words (Monday, Tuesday, etc.) slowly lower both arms, stretching right out, getting lower on each beat of the day words. So, for "Monday" both arms will be straight up at 12 o’clock, "Tuesday" your arms will be at 5-to and 5-past, … "Thursday" at quarter-to and quarter-past and finally by "Sunday" both arms are pointing down to half-past.
Then for the "What day is it today?" part, do the 'palms of the hands up' question gesture.

We also have a video that you can stream in class to sing along with (Internet connection required):

5. Read classroom reader "Days of the Week"
This reader follows on perfectly from the Days of the Week Song and helps to reinforce the weekday vocabulary. Before class, download and print off the reader "Days of the Week". As you go through each page, point to the different activities each character is doing and ask questions to see if any of your students do these activities on the same day, for example:

Teacher: (pointing on page 3) Look, what is Billy doing?
Students: Playing basketball!
Teacher: Yes, that's right! (reading) " I like Mondays because I play basketball after school". How about you, Kazu, do you play basketball on Mondays?
Student (Kazu): No.
Teacher: No. So, what do you do on Mondays?
Student (Kazu): Um. I watch TV after school.
Teacher: Excellent! Well done Kazu! Does anyone play basketball? ... (some students put hands up) ... Mari, do you play basketball?
Student (Mari): Yes.
Teacher: Great? Do you play basketball on Mondays?
Student (Mari): No ... Wednesdays.
Teacher: Good job Mari! Mari plays basketball on Wednesdays.
etc.

Read classroom reader "Days of the Week" Continue through the reader, eliciting the days of the week vocabulary and the activities the characters do each day. Have discussions with your students about who does what on different days.

After reading the story, give out a reader worksheet to each student and read through the story one more time (without stopping for questions, etc.) as students complete the table. Then go through the answers as a class.

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Alternatively, watch our video version of the reader (Internet connection required):

6. Do the "Days of the Week Scramble 2" worksheet

To finish off this section of the lesson, give out the worksheet to everyone to do. As your students are doing the worksheets, ask questions (e.g. "What day is it?", etc.).