The Burning House

(by Nik Peachey)
taken from the site:
Nik's QuickShout

The simple basis behind The Burning House Website is this:

"If your house was burning, what would you take with you?"

It's a really simple website which asks a simple question. The rest of the website has images with accompanying lists sent in by visitors to the site. Each person's list and image has about 10 items.

How to use this with students

Get the students to look at the images and identify what they see.

Save some of the lists and images and get them to match them up for simple vocabulary practice.

Ask the students what they think all the images have in common.

Show students the images and ask them to try to guess what the person who owns the objects is like (great for modals of deduction).

Get students in your class to bring in their on image (you could mix them up and see if they can guess which one belongs to each person.

Get them to upload their image and list to the site or create a wall design in your classroom.

Get students to tell the story behind each of their ten possessions on their list.

Give each students one of the images from the website and ask them to imagine they own the objects and get them to invent the story of why each object is on the list.

Get the students to browse the site and find the person with the list which is most similar to their own.