Present Perfect and Never Activity

Welcome to day 1 of our present perfect activity giveaway! Let’s start nice and easy this time with a very simple present perfect and never activity for your beginner students. This activity is meant for those students have very recently been introduced to the present perfect, or could even be used as a discovery tool to introduce the tense. Here we are focused on using the present perfect to describe events or experiences in the past. Well, with “never” I guess we are talking more about… the lack of certain experiences.

Looks pretty straight forward doesn’t it? Well, just in case…

This present perfect and never activity is designed specifically for absolute beginners and can be used either as a discovery tool or practice.

The poster consists of the phrase “I’ve never…” along with dark blue and light blue bubbles and 4 different characters in the corners. The goal is to create 3 – 5 sentences using the blue bubbles to talk about what one of these characters has never done.

I’ve never read a comic book.
I’ve never told a joke.
I’ve never made a mistake at work.

You’re talking about Erin! I think she works a lot and is very serious.

Students can play in pairs, small groups or as a class. One player at a time will be given 1 minute to create 3-5 sentences to describe one of the characters by announcing things they have never done. If another student correctly guesses the character, both the player and the one who guessed correctly earn one point each. Start off the rounds slowly but then bring up the pace as your students get the hang of it! If their level permits, ask for the responder to say why they think it’s this character.