TESOL Greece

Monday Teaching Tip brought to you by the TESOL Greece Journal No. 3!

July is well upon us and the school year well behind us (or nearing its close for some of our colleagues who are headstarting the next one with summer lessons) so we thought we'd share a low-effort and customizable idea for September.

Desk Pets, as Evangelia (Valia) Nikolaidou calls them in her article for our 168th Issue, act as a classroom management and gamification tool. It engages students on many levels; creatively, by honing their fine motor skills and as a motivational tool. It can work as a reward system, similar to the ever popular sticker system, or as a motivating way to revise language (e.g. by asking simple questions like "what is your desk pet doing?" we are giving students a chance to use relevant language and structures that we have taught them in previous lessons like the present continuous or the action verbs).

You can read more about Valia's insight and experience with using Desk Pets and get inspired to add your own twist by reading this article from our 168th Issue (October-December 2025).

What do you think? Have you ever used Desk Pets in your classroom? Would you be interested to implement them next time you step into class? We would love to hear your thoughts below.