Jonathan Pendleburry, Pearson May 2024
Sentence auction
This is a fun way of checking a longer grammar or vocabulary revision exercise.
1. Give the students an exercise to complete. It could be a grammar or vocabulary exercise, e.g.
finding the mistakes (spelling, word choice, tense, prepositions, conditionals), completing the verb
forms, etc. You probably want a maximum of 10 sentences. The sentences might be on the board
(to make for easier checking later) or on a handout.
2. Give students time to complete the exercise individually.
3. Then put the students into small groups (up to 6, depending on class size) and have them compare
their answers. The aim is for each group to come up with one set of answers, i.e. for the group to
discuss their individual answers and to help each other agree on what they think is the correct
answer to each sentence.
4. Then you need to discuss auctions. Do the students know what they are? Can they describe an
auction? Have they ever been to an auction?
5. Hand out 3000 (dollars, euros, pounds) worth of money (in 100, 200 and 500 notes) to each team.
(Prepare the notes in advance.)
6. Explain the rules of the auction.
a. The aim of the game is to ‘buy’ as many sentences they think they have the right answer
to as possible.
b. Each group will have 3000 (dollars, euros, pounds) to spend.
c. Bids begin at 100 (dollars, euros, pounds).
d. Bids increase by 100 (dollars, euros, pounds) each bid.
e. The sentence will be sold to the highest bidder ("400 going once, 400 going twice, 400
sold to group X!").
f. Once all the sentences have been ‘sold’, the groups will have the chance to tell you the
‘correct’ answer to the sentences they own. If they produce a correct answer, they receive
10 points for that sentence. If they can’t produce a correct answer, the next team (as you
go round the classroom) has a chance to correct the sentence for 5 points.
g. The winner of the game is the group which has the most points.
7. Give the students a bit of time to decide which of their sentences they are certain are correct (i.e.
which they really want to buy and are prepared to spend more money on), which they might buy
if cheap (the ones they are not so sure about), and which ones they definitely don’t want to buy
(because they really aren’t sure about the answer).
8. Then you’re ready to play the game and channel the auctioneer inside yourself – ‘OK. Do I have
any bids for sentence 1… a charming sentence, well worth buying… 200 dollars, anyone… no,
100 then. Who will start me off at 100? Great! 200 anyone? 300! 400! 500! OK, any more bids?
500 going once, 500 going twice, 500 sold to group 1!’
9. Once you have sold all the sentences, you can start checking the answers as a class. Ask whoever
bought sentence 1 to start you off. If they tell you the correct answer, they get 10 points. If not, the
team that is next to them (clockwise) has a chance to answer for 5 points. If they don’t know either,
offer the sentence to the next team. Etc.
10. When all the sentences have been dealt with, the teams can add up their points and see who the
winner is.
11. Once the game has finished, you can analyse each sentence in more detail and clear up any
common mistakes or problems.
