Teaching Vocab

There are many ways to do it, but here's one idea that works for me.  This past week, I was teaching about places: department store, drugstore, electronics store, etc and talking about what you can buy at which place.

So I wrote all the words up on the board, and made sure they understood each one.  I erased them, leaving only the first letter.  Then, I got them to say the words a few times, by memory.  At the end, I got them to spell the words for me and then I erased them all.  

I made them into 4 or 5 teams and one person from each team came up to the board, in their alloted space.  I asked...."Where can I buy a_____?"  They had to write the place on the board.  The first person to write it, got a point and then they would go sit back down and change writers for their team.

This actually helps students remember vocab and it has the novelty factor.  What student doesn't like writing on the board and playing a game?