Giant Fall Vocabulary List and Activities for ESL/ELD Students

ESL andand use right away. They will see these fall vocabulary words throughout the community, at stores, in advertisements, and on holiday cards. EL students always appreciate learning vocabulary that they can see

Not all of these vocabulary words need to be assigned for memorization at once, but having them all on one page provides a good reference for your students to keep in their notebooks.

Several vocabulary activities follow the word list.

Nouns

acorn

almond

apple

apple cider

apple pie

autumn

bat

brown

candy

chestnut

cobweb

colors

Columbus Day

corn

corn maze

corn stalk

cornucopia

costume

country

cranberry / cranberries

cranberry sauce

crops

crow

fall

farmer

feast

festival

fog

foliage

frost

fruit

ghost

gourd

grain

Halloween

harvest

harvest moon

harvester

hay

hay bale

hay ride

hay stack

Indian

Jack-O-Lantern

leaf / leaves

maple

mask

Mayflower

migrate

Native American

November

nuts

October

pear

pecan

pecan pie

Pilgrim

pinecone

pumpkin

pumpkin bread

pumpkin pie

quilt

rake

rice

scarecrow

scarf

season

seeds

September

spider

spider web

squash

squirrel

stuffing

sweater

sweet potato / sweet potatoes

Thanksgiving

treat

treat bag

turkey

vegetables

Veterans' Day

walnut

yam

Adjectives

abundant

bountiful

brown

chilly

cold

colourful

delicious

foggy

haunted

orange

red

ripe

scary

spooky

thankful

yellow

Verbs

bake

carve

change

chop

fall

fly

gather

harvest

migrate

pick

wear

Phrases

Happy Halloween!

Happy Harvest!

Happy Thanksgiving!

back to school

Trick or treat!

Give your students opportunities to use these fall vocabulary words throughout the season in their writing assignments, conversation practice, and in exercises like these:

Word Categories

Sort the fall vocabulary words into categories such as: things you can bake, colors of fall foliage, things that grow, Thanksgiving Dinner Foods, words associated with harvest, and other categories you or your students think of.

Fill In the Blank

As a vocabulary practice activity, write sentences that are missing a word and let your students use their list to determine what word best fills in the blank. Sample sentences using fall vocabulary include:

Pumpkin pie and apple pie are two popular desserts to ______ in the fall.

The farmer put a ______ in the field to scare away the crows.

The children carved the pumpkin into a scary ______.

CLOZE Paragraphs

Cloze paragraphs are paragraphs with words and phrases missing that students fill in on their own. An example of a cloze paragraph using fall vocabulary is:

Fall, also known as ________, is a season that includes the months of _______, _______, and _______. During fall, the weather turns from warm to ________ and the _______ on the trees change from green to _______, _______, _______, and _______.

Writing Assignments and Journal Activities

Give your students plenty of practice using their new words in the journals and other writing assignments. Some journal topics for fall vocabulary include:

What is your favorite part of fall?

What fall activities are happening in your community?

What is your least favorite part about fall?

Word Games

Crossword puzzles, word scrambles, and word searches are great practice. All of these games can be made online at DiscoverySchool.com by using the Puzzle Maker application.