Role Play

Role-play is the act of imitating the character and behavior of someone who is different from yourself.

SpeakingSkill    Role Play    Mono Acting      Pick and Speak

To refer to the playing of roles generally such as in a theatre, or educational setting;

To refer to taking a role of a character or person and acting it out with a partner taking someone else's role, often involving different genres of practice;

Types of role-play?

There are three main types of roleplay: text-based, live-action, and tabletop. 

Text-based roleplaying takes place online and focuses on writing. 

Live-action roleplaying takes place face-to-face; you interact with other people through talking, acting, and occasionally combat.

Tabletop roleplaying can be done in-person or online, and focuses mainly on verbally describing your character's actions. All three are fun, immersive,(involving) and a great way to meet new friends.

What is Roleplay example?

Role playing is defined as pretending (imagining) to be someone else or pretending to be in a specific situation that you are not actually in at the time. An example of role playing is when you pretend (imagine) that your friend is your boss and you have a practice conversation in which you ask for a raise.

Role Play Ideas For Students

There’s A Fly In My Soup

Role Play Topic: Ordering and eating food at a restaurant.

Description: In this role play scenario, students would use their knowledge of food vocabulary and common questions to order food in English at a restaurant. This a common role play topic for English classes with beginner learners.

To make this role play more fun, tell students that after they have ordered their food, and the food has been served, they should then act out that there is a ‘problem’ with the food.

This ‘problem’ could be something as simple as “There’s a fly in my soup!” or “My food is too cold!”, but you can let your students be as imaginative as they like.

This will undoubtedly lead to some very funny role plays! Kids especially will enjoy creating funny and crazy scenarios for their role play.

Where To?

Role Play Topic: Taking A Taxi And Giving Directions

Description: In this role play one student should be the taxi driver and one or two students should be the passenger(s).

The passenger(s) will tell the taxi driver where they want to go. For example, “Take me to the hospital, please.”, “Take me to the candy shop, please.”, etc.

But, there is a problem! This is the taxi drivers first day on the job. And so he/she does not know how to get to the destination. To get to where they want to go, the passengers must give directions to the taxi driver.

To make this simple role play more fun, ask students to imagine they are in a real taxi and when the passengers give the directions, the ‘taxi’ with the students in must move around the classroom.

Kids will love giving directions as they zoom around the classroom while acting out this fun role play.

I Don’t Think So!

Role Play Topic: Debate / Disagreement

Description: In this role play students should act out an argument between two friends.

First choose a fun debate topic. Next, students should act out meeting one of their friends in the street. They begin to talk but everything one person says, the other person disagrees with.

This kind of role play is a great way to teach students how to agree and disagree in English. It is also a fantastic way to prepare students for a real class debate.

Teach Me!

Role Play Topic: Giving Instructions

Description: In this role play one student will play the ‘instructor’ and one student will play the student.

The instructor should guide the student on how to complete a task, and the student should follow the instructions and act out what the instructor is saying.

For example, the instructor could be a chef and could teach the student how to make spaghetti.

There are endless possibilities for this kind of role play and students will love having their classmates follow their instructions.

News Report

Role Play Topic: Past Tense

Description: This last role play idea is a great way to review past tense with students.

Ask students to imagine a funny / crazy thing that happened in their town and then to create a news report about it. For example, ‘There’s a rhino loose in the city!’.

Tell students to think of a headline which sums up the story and a brief description of what happened. Then, the news report can cut to someone ‘in the field’ where they can interview people on the street about what they saw.