Over 100 Present Simple for routines PDFs and teaching ideas (including the related index pages). If you like anything here and would like more, please support TEFLtastic.
Present Simple index pages (for more specific points)
It is/ They are games and other worksheets (for Present Simple of “to be”)
Third person S games/ worksheets (for “She has”, “He goes”, “It works”, etc)
Daily routines games, worksheets, stories and songs
Teaching Present Simple articles
with Present Simple game ideas
56 classroom activities for the Present Simple tense
Video tasks for present tenses
Photocopiable Present Simple classroom activities
and see the index pages above for many more
Good and taboo Present Simple questions with do and be
How often trivia quiz (Present Simple and frequency expressions)
Mr Men daily routines activities
Is it a/ an…? with adjectives pick and draw
Time expressions with Present Simple (frequency expressions and prepositions of time practised with Make Me Say Yes, Things in Common, and Answer Me games)
Small talk questions with be and do (and polished-up version in this very cheap e-book)
Personal questions with be speaking
Days of the week make me say yes
Months hangman guessing game (with suggested things to say about each month)
Days of the week pick and draw
Johnny Slowly, Jeremy Normal and Jimmy Quickly times story
Time expressions with Present Simple speaking and presentation (adverbs of frequency and prepositions of time)
Present Simple taboo questions game
Present Simple matchmakers game
Present Simple job interview roleplays
Present Simple personalised board game
Present Simple sentence completion bluffing game
Present Simple Ask and Tell game
Present Simple needs analysis, presentation and practice (good for a first lesson)
Present Simple/ Adverbs of frequency sentence completion guessing game
Present Simple cultural customs bluffing game
Present Simple work and leisure discussion questions
Present Simple guess the country
Common business verbs Present Simple (guess the verb, discuss things they do in their jobs as needs analysis, brainstorm language to do those things in English)
Present Simple reading, speaking and drawing game
Present Simple men and women guessing
In/ On/ At/ No preposition pelmanism/ snap
Be and have for describing appearance games –
Personal pronouns and possessive adjectives disappearing text memory game (with Present Simple verbs and times)
Describing international companies (mainly Present Simple, plus nationality adjectives and a smattering of other tenses)
Xmas mix and match (third person S, Present Simple and Xmas vocabulary)
Present Simple songs
Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush (link to song on YouTube and my article on using this song in class)
Tubthumper by Chumbawamba (quite a limited number of verbs and a rude chorus that you’ll need to ignore, but a mix of first person and third person – link is to lyrics)
Present Simple for routines stories/ Present Simple picture books
Johnny Slowly, Jeremy Normal and Jimmy Quickly times story
The Going to Bed Book by Sandra Boynton (all Present Simple and good for evening routines vocabulary)
Baby’s Day by Karen Katz (babyish enough to usually just be considered cute instead of patronising by kids, but need to rephrase it to add more Present Simple)
I Live In Tokyo by Mari Takabayashi (maybe getting students to say in English what they do that is the same as the photos, then checking if anything is the same when the teacher reads the text – I guess similar is available for other nationalities/ cities too)
Tale of a Tadpole by Karen Wallace
Holiday! Celebration Days Around the World by Deborah Chancellor
Astronaut Living in Space by Kate Hayden (maybe skipping the first bit in past tenses with her training and getting straight to the routines of a space mission)
Chicken Bedtime is Really Early (the text is probably too difficult, but it has a nice rhythm and the pictures have times with o’clock, take a bath, comb hair, go to sleep, go home, eat dinner, put on your pyjamas, read a bedtime story, drink water, wake up, get up, play, and do exercise)
Gran and Grandpa by Helen Oxenbury
Just Another Ordinary Day by Rod Clement (written in Past Simple, but makes sense as Present Simple and has lots of daily routines vocabulary, with an amusing twist because of the pictures)
Related pages
Time expressions page (for links to days of the week, telling the time, dates, etc)
Present Simple and Continuous page (frankly much more useful than teaching Present Simple on its own for long)
Updated 29 February 2024
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