Vocabulary activity on numbers: Here is my telephone number....what's my name?

Learning numbers can only get so interactive, right? This activity adds an element of mystery by not knowing one's own name until being found.

It's an activity I have designed for beginner French class, but can easily be adapted to other languages. I chose to go with unisex French first names, and kept the phone number format in French. Remember to adapt those to your language when using in other languages.

First, each student gets a card with the following text:

Vous cherchez:

µ Louis(e)

Votre numéro de téléphone:

06 27 59 72 83

That is, student knows her/his own phone number, and the name of the person s/he is looking for. All cards will be provided at the end of this post.

Next, a list of the following format is projected on the screen:

Students are now able to find the phone number of the person they are looking for, and find out the name of any person who reads her/his number to them. There is also a model of the conversation they are expected to replicate.

As seen in the model, each student is required to ask as many people as possible what their phone numbers are until they find the person they are looking for.

I used this as a warm-up. The names are organized in a way that would split my class of 18 students into groups of three for the next activity.

Here is the image which has all the cards:

I hope your students will like it as much as mine!