“To me, old age is always ten years older than I am” John Burroughs
In this engaging lesson, students will consolidate the use of future perfect and future perfect continuous through some engaging activities.
WARM UP
Show them a picture of how you see yourself when you are 70 and explain why you see yourself like that. (below you’ll see the picture I showed my students). After some laughs and a bit of explaining, ask students:
How do you see yourselves when you are 70? Do you look forward to getting old?
Ask them to talk in pairs for two or three minutes and get feedback.
THE POEM- WARMING by Jenny Joseph
This is a nice opportunity to introduce poetry in class.
Explain that the poem they are about to listen/read, written by Jenny Joseph, goes hand in hand with the picture of yourself shown above. After listening to the poem, ask students whether they think the author is looking forward to getting old and why.
It seems the poetess is rebellious, but she is only comfortable to ‘break the rules’ when she has the excuse of old age and senility. Ask students what they think about her attitude.
GALLERY WALK
On the walls of the class display pictures of elderly people reflecting different attitudes towards life when they are old.
Ask students to stand up, have a look at all of them, and decide which one will best represent their attitude to life. They now return to their desks.
Ask them to write two sentences using the future perfect and two sentences using the future continuous, based on the picture they have chosen.
Get students in threes now and ask them to explain their choice to their partners and use the 4 sentences they have written.
Students now work in small groups and answer the following questions about the future. Remind them that they need to elaborate on their answers, giving reasons and using different expressions to give opinions. All the questions contain either a future perfect or a future continuous form; encourage students to use these tenses in their answers.
This lesson is aimed at students with a language level of B1 (intermediate) and focuses on revising, learning and using vocabulary related to learning languages through a variety of engaging activities.
In this lesson students will get listening and speaking practice, learn new vocabulary, and have the opportunity to improve their writing skills.
Guessing the topic.This funny sketch below works like magic to introduce the topic. The idea is to play this short funny video (2:48) and let students guess what we will be talking about.
Now, ask students to discuss these 2 questions:
What’s the most spoken language in the world?
What’s the most widely spoken language in the world?
Revising, introducing and using vocabulary
The idea is to elicit vocabulary by posing some questions and showing some pictures meant to stimulate spontaneous speech and class discussion. New vocabulary will be written on the board. See PDF with targeted vocabulary here
Tell students that of a total of 1, 5 billion speakers only 375 million are native speakers, so this means that over 1 billion people speak English as a second language. Ask them:
How do you think your country ranks in terms of English language proficiency?
Show them the picture below. If their country is not there, click here to see how it ranks. Elicit any reactions to the picture.
Does the ranking surprise them? Why (not)?
Get students in pairs to discuss the question below:
What do you find most difficult about learning English? Why do you think is that?
Listening and Speaking
Part 2. Listening Comprehension. Note taking exercise.
Alex Rawlings, who speaks 11 languages, says that the way to start speaking a language more fluently and more proficiently is to practise speaking. In the video, he gives us four tips to get more practice speaking the language we’re learning.
Get a conversation partner
Talk to yourself.
Learn vocabulary in phrases
Imagine how you’ll use the language.
Watch the video and summarise what he says about each of these tips.
Part 2. Speaking. Reasons for learning a foreign language.
After watching the video, in groups of 3 share the reason why you’re learning English
Answer the following questions
Do you know anybody who has emigrated from your country?
Do you know any immigrants? Can they speak your language?
Before entering your country, should immigrants be required to speak the local language?
Speaking
Writing
Write an article on one of the following:
“If you are not willing to learn, no one can help you. If you are determined to learn, no one can stop you.” Zig Ziglar
“There is no elevator to success; you have to take the stairs”.Zig Ziglar
On November 8, Americans will cast their ballots and decide who is going to be their new president. I don’t know about your country but, in Spain, the “war” between H. Clinton and D. Trump is every day in the news and the “poisonous” debates are thoroughly discussed ad nauseam on TV current affairs programmes.
Being this an issue of so much interest, I thought my students would welcome a brief explanation of what the presidential election in the US entails.
Level: suitable for upper intermediate (B2) and advanced (C1) level English students.
In this lesson students will get listening practice, learn new vocabulary, improve their communicative skills by discussing some interesting quotes and also, their writing skills by choosing one of the quotes to write an opinion essay.
The lesson starts off with some questions about politics which will be discussed in pairs or small groups, followed by some vocabulary exercises extracted from the video in preparation for the listening task that follows. The video for the listening activity is from “The Telegraph” and lasts 2.16. It will be followed by group discussion of two controversial quotes.
I’m currently really tied up with checking exams, so I’m going to make the introduction to this blog post really brief. I’m sure you have enough on your plate, too. June is usually a hectic month for almost everybody, isn’t it?
So, how do you keep up with the latest news? Or maybe, are you one of those who, sick and tired of reading bad news, have decided to completely isolate yourself from the world? I wouldn’t blame you!
If you are one of those, I kindly suggest you make an exception for the sake of learning and improving your English. You won’t regret it! Reading is one of the best ways of acquiring vocabulary and learning grammar without studying.If you read and listen to one article every day, or two if you feel overzealous, your reading and listening skills will improve very quickly. Trust me on this!
This is my selection of the best audio/video news and current affairs websites to learn English.
I have looked at the following features in all the websites:
If the news is written in levels
If the same news is written/read at different levels
If it is audio news or video news
If the transcript is provided
If the site provides a ready-to-use lesson plan for the news
Any other relevant additional content
The image below is interactive. Click on the icon and read what each website has to offer.
How else can I use these sites in the classroom?
• Choose one news website from above and ask students, as homework, to read a piece of news they find interesting. Ask them to read the news several times until they feel confident they can retell it. In the next class, ask students to work in threes and share their news.
• The news. Same procedure as above but this time, at home, students will need to rewrite the piece of news in their own words. In class, and again working in threes, students will be asked to assume the role of newsreaders and present the news to the rest of the class.
The interactive image has been created with Genial.ly,a free online tool for creating visual interactive content.
“Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets”. Arthur Miller.
Hopefully! I surely have had my fair share of mistakes, and consequently a few regrets too although to be honest, I don’t really know if the are of the right kind. There are a couple of things, or maybe more, that I would probably have done differently if given the chance but…. this is now water over the bridge and it’s no use crying over spilt milk! What about you? Do you have any regrets?
Let’s talk about regrets today.
Aim: to teach students how to express regrets using the structures I wish/if only
Level: B2
Lead in: Play this 45-second audio clip and ask students to try to identify the next structure you are going to teach them.
1. I WISH (THAT)/IF ONLY+SIMPLE PAST
Introducing: display the picture below and draw students’ attention to the reflection of the man in the mirror. Ask: What does the old man see in the mirror? What is he thinking?
Listen to the students’ suggestions and use each of them to introduce
I wish (that)/if only + simple past
I wish/if only I was younger or I wish I was in my twenties.
I wish/if only I was handsome or I wish I was stronger… etc
Explaining the grammar: we use this structure to express a desire for a situation that does not exist right now in the present. A wish is a desire to change a real situation into an unreal one. This unreal situation is expressed in the simple past. In a wish sentence, the simple past does not indicate past time; it only indicates that the situation is unreal.
That is optional.
I wish/if only I lived in the countryside, but I don’t. I live in a city.
Were is used for both singular and plural subjects in a formal context
I wish/if only he were younger, but he’s not. He is old.
Practising. Guided practice.
1. Pictures.
Students look at the pictures and make a sentence using “wish”. Flip them to see a possible answer.
2. The power of music. A meditation activity.
Ask students to close their eyes. Turn off the lights, close windows and play some soft music to create the right atmosphere and help them relax. Tell them you are going to ask them some questions about themselves. Use a low, slow, soothing voice. They will need to imagine how they would answer the question using the structure I wish/if only + past tense. Read out the questions one by one, take your time and remember to keep your voice slow and calm.
If you could change something in your body, what would it be?
If you could change something about your personality, what would you change?
If you could change anything about your job, what would it be?
If you could change something about you partner, what would it be?
If you could change something about your life, what would it be?
If you could change one thing in the world, what would it be?
Practising. Freer practice.
Students in pairs talk about their anwers to the questions above. Let them choose the ones they want to talk about as some answers could be a bit personal.
2. I WISH (THAT)/IF ONLY+ WOULD
Introducing: display the picture below and ask students to describe what they see.
Now, ask students to provide a sentence with “wish” about the picture. At this stage, students will probably suggest “She wishes he didn’t see so much TV”.
Draw students’ attention to the girl’s mood and offer this alternative sentence
She wishes/if only he wouldn’t watch so much football
Explaining grammar: the structure wish+ (that)/if only +would is used to talk about what other people do that annoys or irritates us and that we wish was different.
Practising. Guided practice.
Play the video and ask students to make sentences based on the pictures using I wish+would.
Practising. Freer Practice.
Students in pairs answer these questions:
What annoys you about living where you live now?
What annoys you most about living at home with your family?
What annoying habits does your best friend have?
What is the most annoying thing about your partner?
Is there anything about your teacher that annoys you? 🙂
3. I WISH/IF ONLY + (THAT) + PAST PERFECT
Introducing. Display the picture below and ask: do you think he has any regrets?
Elicit: He wishes he hadn’t drunk so much or he wishes he hadn’t danced so much
Photo by JeanJulien
Explaining the grammar:
We use ‘wish’ + past perfect to talk about regrets from the past. These are things that have already happened but we wish they had happened in a different way.
Practising. Guided Practice.
Introduce the activity by asking students to think back to the time when they were teenagers. Ask them if they have any regrets.
For example: I wish I hadn’t given up my studies.
Tell students they are going to watch a video of a song Mistakes of my Youth by the American rock band Eels. In this video, the singer thinks back on his childhood and all the things he did wrong. Ask them to watch the video and write down as many I wish/if only + past perfect sentences they can think of based on the video.
Freer practice.
What are your regrets when you think back on your life? Make a list of three regrets and tell the story to your partner.
Writing a dialogue. Working in pairs, the students should write a conversation among two friends who are complaining about their boyfriends/girlfriends or bosses. Tell them to use as many I wish/if only sentences as possible. Ask students to act it out.
Writing about being the opposite gender. Ask students to write a compositions about how their lives would be different if they were the opposite sex. Ask them to use I wish/ if only sentences
Discussion about cultural customs. Lead a class discussion about what customs in their country wish were different.
