Where do you find role-plays for your language students, and what are your sources of inspiration?

If you’re seeking fresh and engaging role-plays to add to your teaching repertoire or looking to jazz up the ones you already have, here’s an interesting tool for you to try.

I’ve made this Role-Play Ready Generator as a brainstorming tool to help language teachers come up with role-play ideas for their students. It generates a scenario description and role-play cards with action options, a few examples of useful language for each role, and some *secret information. Make sure to read How to Use the Generator below to make the most of it.

Role-Play Ready

Create a Role-Play for Language Learners

Enter the details to generate role-play cards.

Learning Goal What is the learning objective of this role-play?

Topic What is the context of this role-play?

Number of Participants

Proficiency Level

Twist* Any twist in the scenario, e.g., Restaurant Soupernatural, a clumsy waiter, etc.

Role-Play Cards

Your Role-Play Cards will appear here.

How to Use the Generator

I’ve created this Role-Play Generator as a brainstorming tool to help language teachers come up with more ideas for role-plays suitable for learners in class. It’s easy to use – simply fill in the main details such as Learning Objectives, Topic, and the Number of participants in the role-play (e.g., 2 or 3 persons).

The Twist section allows you to specify your particular preferences, such as the setting or location you’d prefer, specific features of characters (e.g., a clumsy shop assistant), or your students’ interests to make the role-play more relevant for them. Be creative to make your role-play unique. The more specific information you feed into the generator, the more interesting ideas you may get.

A word of caution: I’m often asked about the purpose of blogging nowadays when ideas can be generated in a blink. Yet, the role-plays you find on this (e.g., ‘O Romeo, Romeo, Wherefore Art Thou Romeo?‘) and other blogs are activities that have actually been put to the test in real classrooms. The accompanying posts offer insights and practical tips to help you effectively use role-plays in the classroom.

While AI can spit out some interesting ideas, it’s essential to exercise your judgment and figure out what may or may not work with your learners, and tweak and align these ideas with your learning outcomes and your learners’ interests.

Remember, AI is a game of chance. If the first option doesn’t seem suitable, run the generator several times until you find a gem idea!