Academic Collocations ACL Worksheets, Activities and Games

In this comprehensive academic collocations worksheet, students become familiar with the meaning and usage of the 10 most frequently encountered collocations used in academic contexts. First, students match sentence halves together to form sentences containing academic collocations. Next, students complete gap-fill statements using the academic collocations. In the final exercise, students decide if they agree or disagree with the statements and then discuss their answers in small groups.

In this free academic collocations worksheet, students learn the meaning and usage of the most frequently used academic collocations 11 to 20. First, students match academic collocations from a box to their correct definitions. Next, students identify sentences with collocation errors and correct them. After that, students complete gaps in a sentence with three collocations from Exercise A. In the final exercise, students decide if they agree with the opinion expressed in the sentence and then discuss their thoughts with a partner.

In these useful academic collocation exercises, students practice the meaning and usage of the 21 to 30 most frequently encountered collocations used in academic contexts. To start, students match sentence halves together to form sentences containing academic collocations. Students then complete gap-fill statements using the academic collocations. In the next exercise, students decide if they agree or disagree with particular statements by completing a table, giving reasons for their answers. Finally, students discuss their answers in small groups.

In this productive academic collocations worksheet, students learn the meaning and practice the usage of the 31 to 40 most used academic collocations. First, students match sentence halves together to form sentences containing academic collocations. Students then complete statements using the collocations. Finally, in small groups, students discuss whether they agree or disagree with the statements in Exercise B, giving reasons for their answers and asking follow-up questions to discuss each item fully.

Here are two enjoyable academic collocation games to help students practice recognising and using academic collocations that frequently appear in academic texts. First, students play a pelmanism game where they match cards together to form academic collocations. In pairs, students take turns turning over one card from each set. If the two cards match to form an academic collocation, the student keeps the two cards and has another turn. If not, the student turns the cards back over and play passes to the other student. When the students have finished, they use a cheat sheet to check their answers. The student with the most correct matches wins the game. After that, students play a game of snap by matching the first part of an academic collocation with the second part. Both students turn over a card from their pile at the same time. If the cards form an academic collocation, the first student to say 'Snap!' scores one point. The winning student then tries to create a sentence using the collocation for an extra point. Students then pick up their own cards, shuffle them and play again. If a student says 'Snap!' when the cards don't match, the other student scores a point and the game continues. The first student to score 20 points wins the game.

This engaging academic vocabulary card game helps students practice making logical connections between collocations and explaining their reasoning clearly. Players work in teams of four, taking turns building chains of related academic collocations. Each player starts with four collocation cards, while the remaining cards form a draw pile in the centre. When it's their turn, players must connect one of their cards to the previous card by explaining a clear logical relationship, such as cause and effect or steps in a process. The other team members then vote on whether the connection makes sense. If the majority agrees, the card stays in the chain and play continues. If they disagree, the player takes their card back and draws a new one from the pile. Players who cannot make any connection must draw a card and try again, or pass their turn if still unable to connect. The process continues until someone uses all their cards, and that player wins the game.