Easter Lesson Plan for ESL Kids Teachers

Notes:

Make this lesson as fun as possible - your students will learn while having a great time.

Lesson Procedure:

Warm Up and Maintenance:

1. Greetings
Start the lesson as you usually would (E.g. Hello song, "What's your name?", "How are you?", homework check, etc.).

2. Make Craft: Easter Bunny Ears
Tell your students that today is a special lesson - an Easter lesson! Show a picture of the Easter Bunny. Teach "Easter Bunny" and "ears". Take out the craft which you had made before the class and put it on your head. Tell your students they are going to make the same craft. Before class prepare the shapes: cut a strip of card for the headband and two ear shapes (including pink inner ears) per student. In class, give out the headband strips and ear shapes to your students and let them decorate the headband and ears with crayons, markers, glitter, etc.

Finally, measure the headband on each student’s head and glue or staple in place and glue on the ears. Your students can now wear this for the duration of the lesson!

Make Craft: Easter Bunny Ears

3. Sing The Easter Song (for younger kids)
Now that you have made your rabbit ears let's have some fun being rabbits! First teach the two gestures: hopping around like a rabbit and looking for Easter eggs. Then play the song and have everyone hop around and have fun (download MP3 song at the end of this page).

Lyrics for "The Easter Song"

Chorus:
Easter rabbit, Easter rabbit,
Comes when I'm in bed,
Easter rabbit, Easter rabbit,
Hiding chocolate eggs.

Verse 1:
Look in the garden (garden)
Look in the living room (living room)
Look in the kitchen (kitchen)
Look everywhere!

Where are the chocolate eggs?

Chorus

Verse 2:
Look in the bedroom (bedroom)
Look in the dining room (dining room)
Look in the bathroom (bathroom)
Look everywhere!

Where are the chocolate eggs?

Verse 3:
I've found my chocolate eggs!
I've found my chocolate eggs!
Yummy! Yummy! Yummy! Yummy!
Chocolate eggs!

Gestures for "The Easter Song"

The actions for this song are very simple, fun and energetic – lots of hopping around like a rabbit!

Everyone stands up for the song:

For the chorus, everyone hops around the classroom like a rabbit
For the verses, pretend to be looking for Easter eggs (gesture with palm of hand over eyes)

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

New Learning and Practice:

1. Teach new vocab: Easter egg, chocolate, basket
Take out the Easter Bunny picture again. Point to the Easter eggs in the bunny's basket and ask what they are and teach / elicit: "Easter egg". Take out a mini-Easter egg (the type which is covered in colorful foil). Teach / elicit: "Easter egg" and "chocolate". Elicit the colors of the foil. Take out a small basket (or even a paper box is fine) and teach "basket". Put the egg in the basket.

2. Teach / Review "Do you like ~", "Yes, I do", "No, I don't"
Take off the foil wrapper and show the chocolate egg. Say "Yummy!". Then say "I like chocolate!", and eat the Easter egg, all the time saying "yummy!" At this point your students will probably be clamoring for an egg. Give out a little basket (simple paper boxes are also fine) to each student. Pull out another egg (it is probably a good idea to have them hidden somewhere, e.g. in a large pocket) and say to one student, "Do you like chocolate?". Teach / Elicit "Yes, I do" (or "No, I don't" in the unlikely event that someone doesn't like chocolate!). Continue with all the students - only giving the eggs to kids who answer correctly (come back to the ones who made a mistake later). Don't let your student eat the eggs - they have to collect and keep in their baskets to take home.

3. Teach / Review prepositions of location "in", "on", "under"
Take out a small box and elicit / teach "box". Put an egg in the box. Ask "Where is the Easter egg?". Teach "It's in the box". Chorus this phrase 3 times. Next teach / elicit "on" and "under" the box (each time chorusing 3 times). Then do a check by putting the egg in, on and under the box and asking your students where the egg is. Do with a few more objects in place of the box (e.g. pencil case, book, etc.).

4. Play "Preposition Easter Egg Hunt"
Now to practice the prepositions to find some Easter eggs! Before class, hide around 4 eggs per student all around the classroom - in drawers, on shelves, under cushions ... anywhere you can think of (try to remember where they are!). Say to one student "Look in / on / under (the book)" (you can point). The student can go and look and then find the egg and put in his/her basket. Do twice for each student so that everyone has collected two eggs each. Finally, say that there are two more eggs per student hidden in the classroom. Let everyone go off hunting (but they must each stop after finding two more eggs). As your students are hunting you can help them out by giving more directions using prepositions.

Play "Preposition Easter Egg Hunt"

5. Do "Find the Easter Eggs" worksheet activity
This is a nice worksheet which mirrors the Easter Egg hunt activity your students just did. Give all the students the worksheet and have them follow the lines and color the Easter eggs. As they are working ask individual students questions (e.g. What's this?, What color is it?, etc.).

6. Read classroom reader "Where are the Chocolate Eggs?"
This classroom readers ties in perfectly with the "Preposition Easter Egg Hunt" activity and worksheet your students have just finished.

Before class, download and print off the reader "Where are the Chocolate Eggs?". As you go through each page, point to the pictures and ask where the Easter Egg is hidden, helping with vocab:

Teacher: Where is the chocolate egg? (with kitchen page open)
Students: The oven!
Teacher: Yes, that's right! Is it on the oven?
Students: No, in the oven!
Teacher: Yes, good job! The chocolate egg is in the oven!

Get the students really involved in the story by asking lots of questions (e.g. eliciting the objects and the colors of the eggs).

After reading the story, give out a reader worksheet to each student and have everyone complete the exercise. Then go through the answers as a class.

---

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

7. Play "Pin the tail on the Easter Rabbit"
Create the rabbit (make one of your own or use our sheet) and have blindfolded students tape the cotton ball tail onto the rabbit. Mini-Easter eggs can be prizes!

Play "Pin the tail on the Easter rabbit"

8. Make "Easter Cards" for parents
You can easily make these in class with some construction paper, felt and common craft supplies. Before class, cut out enough card for each student for the actual card. Also, cut out the green grass for each student and different colored oval shapes for the eggs. Finally, cut out strips of felt for the ribbons and small circles to stick on the eggs. In class, have your students glue the felt onto the cards. Older kids can write an Easter message inside the card and for smaller kids you can help them write their own message (even get them to trace over a message written lightly in pencil). A nice idea is to have each student give their card to their parents after the lesson (in an envelope if you can stretch your budget far enough!).

Wrap Up:

1. Assign Homework: "Color the Easter Egg" for younger learners or "Easter Egg Color Code" for older kids.
2. Do your usual end of class routine (tidy up, put away things in their bags, sing "Goodbye song", etc).
3. Sing "The Easter Song" one more time.
4. As each student goes to the door to leave the classroom show them a mini-Easter Egg and ask a question (e.g. Do you like chocolate? What color is it? Where is it?). If they get the word right, they can win the egg and leave. If wrong, they have to go to the back of the line and try again.