As far as hangman goes, here’s a real reason to be careful about playing it with some ESL students. When I taught ESL, I was told to be careful about playing that game with refugee kids from countries where hanging was actually used, as the kids may have been exposed to it in a not so “fun and games” manner. I wish I’d known about “spiderman” when I was teaching those classes!

And, truth be told, it wasn’t that awful. Many of our ESL students had heard some of that language and were pleased to finally find out what the PC terms meant and why the more traditional terms are less frequently used in government or other politically sensitive language. Some of them did question the purpose of the non-sexist language (since gender-specific terms are unavoidable in their own language) and even ridiculed the terms; however, I felt good that whatever conclusions they came to were their own, and not initiated by my bias.

PC language is a part of American English, whether we like it or not. By exposing our students (especially ESL as opposed to EFL in your case) to these terms, we are helping them prepare for reality.