18 ENGLISH PROJECT

IDEAS YOU CAN DO

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So, you are looking for interesting and creative English project ideas
to spice up your lessons?

Here are 18 practical projects that will help your students get creative
while enhancing their written and communicative English skills. These
are applicable to your middle school and high school students. 

Creative English Project Ideas

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Test your students’ creativity by asking the them to make an
advertisement for inventions of their own. Or they can stick to readily
available products within the market. 

Ask them to start with the connection: how their product will solve the
issue of their ideal customers. Tell them that the best advertisements
trigger consumers’ emotions. Let them use powerful adjectives to
inspire their fictional customers.

Elevator Pitch 
Like advertisement activity, this project also focuses on commercial
communication. You would like to assign this project only to high
school students because of the amount of research that goes into it. 
Start by asking students to review successful elevator pitches of
successful startups. 

Detail the necessary information and persuasive tactics.

Ask them to create their own business model or select one from vast
startups present in the business world. 

The last step is to present the whole concept in 3 minutes or less. 

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ASSESSMENT TOOLS FOR
TEACHERS
Abstract Word Art Activity

If you’re looking for a fun group project for 4 or more kids,

wacky abstract word art activity is just the ticket. Offering writing
practice and grammar review, this isn’t your average art project.
Kids practice building sentences with different parts of speech, then
create paintings of the silly mad-lib sentences they come up with. In
an unexpected fun twist, at the end they get to rip up their paintings
and arrange them into wild and unique abstract collages.

Autobiographies
In this fun project, you ask the students to detail their life history in an
interesting tone. To avoid monotone, ask them to only include those
events in life which they consider adventurous or unforgettable. 

Ask them to highlight emotions rather than timeline. 

You can add a twist to the exercise by asking them to write their ideal
future life in an epilogue.

Book Clubs
This project will focus on verbal communication skills. 

Ask the students to select a book or excerpt from a book to read. You
can assign a genre to keep the communication streamlined. 

Students can take turns to give a short review of their reading together
with their viewpoints about it. They can talk about the moral values of
the characters or change endings or events to discuss if the plot
becomes more entertaining with these changes. 

Check out these ideas on how to run a successful Book Club!

Class Magazine
This is a perfect project for all classes in middle and high school. You
can take it to the next level by asking the whole school to start a
competition for the best class magazine. 

You can ask your class to select a theme of environmental, health,

literary, or societal topic. 

Then ask them to gather all skills; idea-generation, writing, design,

and presentation. You will get the most benefits if you make it
mandatory for every student to produce content for one page of the
magazine. (You can include the advertisement activity within the
activity of class magazine.)

Comic Strip 
This is another extensive project that will not only win the hearts of
your students but also allow you to assess their creative capabilities. 

Ask them to illustrate interesting events from their lives, or

imagination, in the form of comic strips. 

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FOR ANY LANGUAGE CLASS
Dramas
This activity is similar to the comic activity given above. The only
difference is the increased detail that is required in drama writing. An
absence of images adds the obligation on the students to describe
scenes and expressions. 

Again, students can describe any life event from their reality or
imagination. 

You can later ask the students to act on the best dramas to improve
their verbal and non-verbal communication. 

Paper Mache Activity

In this messy yet super fun project, students make paper mache
futuristic Earths or other imaginary planets as described in science
fiction.

This was my cross-curricular activity based off of our Literature

reading of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and a unit topic in
English about the environment and recycling. Of course, you can do
paper mache for any lesson or unit that you have!

This article gives you the step-by-step instruction on how to do paper

mache in the classroom!

Editorial/ Fan Letter

Editorial is one of English project ideas most suitable for high-
schoolers while fan letters work for learners from all English expertise
levels. 

Ask your high-schoolers to analyze a societal issue that is close to

their heart. Next, they need to define the problem from the viewpoint
of aggrieved parties. Ask them to write out the problem and get it
published in a local or national newspaper. 

(Be ready to proofread and edit the piece before they send it to
relevant personnel.)

Younger students can write fan letters to their best actors, authors,
and singers. 

Inventions
This is another English project which will combine societal, and
practical, understanding with English learning. In this project, the
students will learn problem-solving skills. 

Ask them to understand a societal or scientific problem. Once they

have understood and defined this issue, they have to provide a
solution to this problem. 
In the end, they have to present their solution together with the need
which gave rise to it in front of the class. (You may want them to
include presentation slides for visual effects.)

Diorama

This activity is one of my students’ favorites not only because it’s fun
but also because it facilitates their learning. I tried this project on two
literature readings I had before (The Prince and the Pauper by Mark
Twain and Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe) and both achieved the
same fantastic end.

In this project, students are tasked to illustrate the setting or a specific

part of the book in the form of a three-dimensional miniature scene.
Students will pick a favorite scene from the story they are reading and
decide how they want to represent it using the materials given (above)
and a variety of design strategies.

Parodies
This writing exercise contains the most fun among all the given
projects. You will excite their creativity as well as their inner critic.

Start by inquiring about the literary work which fascinates or inspires

them most. 

Ask them if they can add humor to that piece. Let them edit a single
character or scene or if they want they can give a humorous outlook to
the whole plot. 

Fables 
This open-ended English writing project will ask the students to select
one event in their life. This event should be intriguing as well as
contain a life lesson. 

Then, they have to retell this piece in third person pronoun. Ask them
to keep the tone conversational as well as engaging. 

In the end, ask them to write a conclusive moral of the story. 

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ACTIVITIES FOR ESL STUDENTS
Self-Portrait Project
These self-portrait ideas were part of a short project that went really
with my middle school ESL class so I thought I’d share them with you.

My students were able to come up with three products in one activity:

a mind map, a self-portrait and an essay. The unit topic was about
“Identity” or “Personality” but I guess this will work for general
descriptive adjectives lesson as well. 

Charts 
If you want to include futuristic touch to your English lessons, include
a thing or two from STEM subjects. One great way is to ask them to
explain or detail a mathematical chart. (You can come up with
variations in this original plan. For example, you can ask future
businessmen to interpret graphics related to market studies.)

See, if they have enough vocabulary and concepts to comprehend

and convey the message to their fellows. 

Fictional Pen-Pals
Just like fan letters, this activity asks the students to write letters to
their favorite characters in fictional and non-fictional worlds. 

Ask them to pinpoint the era, region, settings they like most in a given
novel or historical account. Next, they would show interest in one of its
characters and the reason for this interest. 

In the end, they need to write a letter to this character praising or

advising him/her regarding his/her role in the piece. (You can reply on
behalf of that character if you think the point made by the student
inspires further dialogue.) 

Book Trailer Project

Book Trailer Project is a digital storytelling activity for middle school or

high school students after they finish reading a book. Students need to
take the key idea from the book to create a short video that persuades
people to check out a book they have read.

Doing the book trailer project requires students to summarize,

synthesize and analyze the book and put that analysis in their
trailer. Furthermore, having students create book trailers is a great
way to incorporate technology in the classroom and encourage
reading. Thus, book trailer project is a great alternative to boring book
report assignments, and can easily be done individually or in groups.
Take Away
So these are some of creative English project ideas you can use in
your English class to prompt your students to express their creativity
and language skills. These are fun, practical, and learning-inducing. 

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Check out These Fun Ideas for an Alternative

Approach to Those Oral Presentations
In most ESL classes, there comes a time when students must prove their
oral skills, either through a speaking exam or an oral presentation.
Traditionally these are done orally in front of the class, but using video for
the oral presentation may help to calm some nerves and allow for a lot of
creativity on the student's part. It's up to the teacher to assign a project that
works for the level, assesses the target grammar or vocabulary, and gives
the student a chance to demonstrate their progress in a creative and fun
way. And no extra equipment or software is necessary because students can
make and edit their videos right from their smartphones or tablets.

Here are seven fun and engaging video projects for ESL learners:

1. Infomercials
We've all seen those late night infomercials that go on and on about how
desperately we need some silly contraption. Show your students some
example infomercials – there are plenty of compilation videos on Youtube
that show some of the worst of the worst (and in this case, bad is good)
which will have even some of the most basic learners laughing. After playing
the video once for them to get the idea, play it again and instruct the
students to write down as many key phrases that they hear in each
infomercial, i.e. “Are you tired of…?”, “The secret is…”, “It's
only…!”. Then elicit the phrases from them and compile them on the
board. Now that they've learned all the necessary vocabulary, they are
ready to create their own, coming up with a name, slogan, price, etc. It
helps the students practice persuasion, question intonation, adverbs like
only, just, never, and always, and exaggeration.

2. Reenacting and Parodying

Involving literature and pop-culture into ESL classes is always a good idea
because it's usually something the students are familiar with, which makes
them feel enthusiastic and comfortable, despite the language barriers. If
you're studying a certain book, you can have your students break into
groups and choose a scene to reenact and film. You can also give them the
freedom to change a story line however they like, whether it's transforming
Romeo and Juliet into a zombie movie or making a modern-day fairytale.
You can do the same with popular movie scenes, especially ones that use a
target grammar point. Musically inclined learners can create their own music
videos, either writing their own songs with the target grammar or vocabulary
or parodying an existing one.

3. News Report or Talk Show

Most people are familiar with how a news show works, but showing the class
a few examples might be a good place to start with this project. This will
help them learn key vocabulary like anchor, reporter, and newsroom, and
phrases like “Back to you with the weather…”. Students can break up
into groups, wear costumes, and assign roles like weatherperson, sports
reporter, and so on – this equips them with all kinds of vocabulary!
Another way to do this project is through a talk show in which students can
pretend to be celebrities and a host can interview them, helping them
practice asking questions and giving detailed responses, as well as public
speaking.

4. Make a Political Campaign Ad

With the rather eventful and much-talked about political year that's just
passed, politics has become quite the hot topic in the classroom. To teach
students political vocabulary, you can have a weekly discussion of the most
recent political goings-on, noting useful terms. Go deeper by teaching them
about the American political system. Eventually, you might work your way
up to a mock election. Students can divide themselves into political parties,
hold debates, and create campaign ads for their video project. Politics gives
them a wide range of vocabulary practice from social issues to national
security to fiscal matters.

5. Screencast Demonstration
For those students who are a bit camera shy, a screencast demonstration
could be a great way to do an oral video project, without having to be in
front of the camera. It's also good if you're in need of a solo project.
Screencast videos are usually used to explain computer programs, so the
project gives students a chance to learn and practice tech vocabulary as well
as grammar points like commands and ordinal numbers and phrases. But it
doesn't have to be a tech demonstration – it could be a “how to” on just
about anything!

6. Cooking Show
Another great way to practice “how to” grammar and vocabulary is
with a cooking show. It's a fun project that students can film at home in
their kitchen, and even bring the food in to share with the class. Add in a
writing element by having students write out recipes in their own words. To
beef it up even more, you can make it a multicultural learning experience by
having each student choose a recipe from a different country, dress up in its
traditional garb, and share some information about the country. This project
also teaches measurements in English, which can be quite tricky without
some context.

7. Create a “TED Talk”

TED Talks are really useful in ESL classes for conversation days. Just play a
talk, have some discussion questions ready, and let the class share their
opinions. After having a few TED classes, you might have your students
create their own, filming them for the class to review later. This is a very
free and open project in which students can get as personal as they want,
sharing a story from their childhood, talking about their fears, or sharing
some of their biggest life goals. But they don't have to be personal – they
can talk about a scientific discovery, a country they'd like to visit, or just
about anything really. It just gives them the opportunity to have the floor
and express themselves, all while practicing public speaking. Rather than
focusing on a target grammar, it gives them a chance to speak freely about
something they are passionate about.

If you give these a try in your classroom, we hope you'll stop by and let us
know how it went (and maybe share some links to some created content, if
students have given permission to share)!