Yes-No Games in a Foreign Language Classroom

A man pushes a wheelbarrow past a hotel, and sighs with relief. Why?

Beulah died in the Appalachians, while Craig died at sea. Everyone was much happier with Craig's death. How can you explain this?

A woman enters a room, locks it and starts taking off her clothes. At this moment the light goes off and someone whistles. Explain the situation.

All these are examples of the so-called yes-no games. Traditionally, they are understood as situations when a group has to find an answer to something by asking questions to which the leader answers ‘yes’ or ‘no’. This kind of activity is quite popular in a foreign language classroom. Many teachers like to play this game as it helps them focus on the ways of asking questions, learn additional vocabulary and simply bring more fun to the classroom. In the context of the Thinking Approach (TA) to language teaching and learning (for details, see www.thinking-approach.org), yes-no games perform one more important purpose – they are used for the development of students’ inventive thinking skills. However, several important changes have to be made in the procedures used by the teacher. In this short paper I will first describe these changes, then provide examples of various types of yes-no games and, finally, discuss reasons for bringing them to the classroom.

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