Write a Conversation Exercises for Speaking and Listening Classes
Updated 25th November 2022
Create-a-conversation worksheets help students practice new vocabulary, build speaking skills and develop confidence using a second language. These PDF worksheets are great for classroom and online teaching. They are easy to submit, edit and correct online, especially in Google Classroom. In addition, example conversations with video and audio are provided with the worksheets. So these exercises are perfect for speaking and listening classes.
The audio file or the video on YouTube can be used as listening activities. In particular the YouTube video is great for online listening activities. The PDF create-a-conversation worksheet is an excellent way to assess students’ language abilities.
I teach really large classes. One of the biggest problems in large classes is assessing students’ speaking and language abilities. So, at the end of a class I hand out the worksheets. Of course, this can be done online more easily (no paper!). The students create their own conversation or dialogue and come and perform the dialogue for me. Or they can make a video and submit online. Or they can just submit the written conversation. I give each student a score. This exercise (write a conversation format ) can be done every 2 or 3 classes (or even every class!-it’s worked really well for me) and gradually you build up a really accurate picture of a students’ abilities.
Note: if you are really interested in speaking activities and conversational exercises, have a look at my newsletter post. It explains how to create fantastic conversational exercises with AI.
The Art of Prompting Artificial Intelligence for ESL Teachers
1 What’s your house like?(talking about houses & neighborhoods)
This is a conversation writing exercise which could be the basis of a speaking activity or role play. Students get to talk about and describe their houses and neighborhoods.
Write a conversation: houses & neighborhoods (PDF)
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2 Comparative adjectives conversation
This is a listening/speaking exercise to help students practice and understand the use of comparative adjectives.
(see the YouTube video – gap fill version)
3 Write a conversation exercise: plans for the weekend (with examples and audio)
“Plans for the weekend” is a future tense conversation exercise. It requires students to understand language for talking about the future. But the good thing about these exercises is that students can choose words and phrases they can manage.
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4 Vacation and travel
In this conversation, one woman asks her friend about the resort she stayed at on her vacation.
5 Talking about childhood
This is a gap fill conversation and listening/speaking exercise about childhood featuring “use to/used to” to help English language students talk about the past.
6 Write a conversation: what are you doing at the end of the year?
Students can watch the video or listen to the audio and complete the gap fill conversation. Then they have to use at least 6 of the most common words or phrases to make their own conversation.
What are you doing at the end of the year? (PDF)
7 Write a conversation exercise: greetings and introductions (with conversation gap fill, video and audio)
Greetings and introductions (PDF)
8 Write a conversation exercise: going out
“Going Out” is another good conversation topic. When students write these dialogues in pairs or small groups they automatically fall into a role play mode without any direction from the teacher.
9 Write a conversation exercise: routines and daily activities with dialogue and audio for a listening exercise
Write-a- conversation exercises work really well for many topics including routines and daily activities. I always get the students to perform just for me …not in front of the class..as they are more relaxed and I get a close up and personal look at their performance. Also, I can ask them to repeat the conversation easily if it is not fluent enough.
Routines and daily activities (PDF)
(YouTube video gap fill version)
10 What does she look like?
Staring a business is a popular topic with teenagers and university students. They have lots of ideas and opinions. This includes example conversations (restaurant and laundry service) with audio.
This is a listening/speaking exercise for describing people. This exercise focuses on a missing woman. Students can completer the listening exercise and then write their own conversation.
11 Write a conversation exercise: simple past tense
Writing conversations with language cues is one good way of getting into the past tense. Students have to think about a past tense context and and create a role play for this context. The language cues give them some assistance in guiding and developing their ideas. Also, there are 2 example conversations that can be used as listening exercises.
Create a past tense conversation (PDF)
12 Making an appointment telephone conversation (with answers)
This is a dialogue or role play exercise for students s to practice creating complete telephone conversations . Students use the cues in the boxes to write appropriate conversations.
Making an appointment telephone conversation (PDF)
13 Write a conversation exercise: start a business (with audio and example conversations)
Create a conversation- start a business (PDF)
Starting a restaurant business
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14 Write a conversation exercise: health
Here, students have to write a health and illness conversation or dialogue. Writing a dialogue about health is one of the best ways to get students using health vocabulary, which can cause quite a few pronunciation problems.
Create a conversation- health (PDF)
15 Write a conversation exercise: talking about families
Talking about the families is another easy topic for dialogue/conversation writing for elementary English learners. This exercise includes 3 example conversations and one conversation (audio file) that can be used as a listening activity.
Write a conversation: family (PDF)
16 Create a conversation: personality
Writing a conversation exercises work really well for some topics and personality is one of the best. This works best with lower level students of course, but with advanced students you have to encourage them to build on their ideas.
Write a conversation: personality(PDF)
17 Write a conversation exercise: friendship
Of course, friendship is a great topic for getting students to use adjectives for personality and describing people.
18 Write a conversation exercise: food and eating
One of the best conversation writing topics is food. Students instantly start creating fun role plays. Also, vocabulary around food and eating brings in a lot of interesting pronunciation challenges.
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19 Write a conversation exercise: problem/solution
Here, students have to compare the past and present using “used to”. It’s a fun and interesting conversation writing exercise for students with some fluency.
Create a conversation- problem solution (PDF)
Great material thanks a lot
Excellent material I will use with my students, Thanks a lot.
Very helpful. Thank you
Thanks for the comments. I’ve got lots more of these. I use them a lot.
Thank you. These worksheets are a great help to guide conversation starters for beginners ,especially those for who are learning English as a second language.
Thanks a lot . I appreciate it .
Very nice material! Thanx a lot.
I’m gradually adding example dialogues and audio.
Please can you help me on how to answer my dialogue
I will use this material with my students thanks a lot
Hello I am an ESL teacher from Mexico, these are great materials for conversation classes, I am starting a course tomorrow and I found this web. With these I have a wide viriety of activities for my conversation classes.
Thank you very much for sharing, that is a great attitude.
Wonderful teaching materials. Thanks a lot!