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Crazy families.

Level: YL Time: 45-60min

This lesson provides an opportunity for YL to practise family vocabulary and have some fun with it.

You can pre-teach the vocabulary or encourage SS to guess the meaning from the context. You can put SS into pairs or groups and hand out the text and image cards for matching. Explain that SS need to read the family descriptions and match each description with its corresponding picture. You can read the cards if your SS can’t do that yet.

After that invite SS to draw a picture of a family. Then they write a short text describing that family. Make an activity similiar to this one with their cards and pictures. My SS loved to see their own work turned into teaching material.

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What’s in it for us?

Level B2/C1 Time: 90min

Putin has declared that referendums in four partially occupied areas of Ukraine have delivered a mandate for assimilation into what Moscow calls Russian territory.

On top of that he has started ‘partial mobilisation’ with plans to recruit 300.000 civilians.

And last week it became clear that Kremlin wants the use of nuclear weapons to be considered a real possibility and, as Putin said, “it’s not a bluff.”

In such circumstances I felt that it’s necessary to introduce the topic of the war in Ukraine in my high school classes.

What started as a search for material on the war, ended up being a very fruitful and enriching experience and discussion on geopolitics, privilege and rhetoric skills.

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Stuff That Animals Can & Can’t Do

Time: 45-60 min Level: YL

Lucas the Spider is my all times favorite conversation starter for Young learners. This time he is trying to play hide and seek with a chameleon. He is not doing so great, obviously.

Perfect opportunity to introduce or practice can/can’t strutures and movement/activity vocabulary. I started with a vocabulary presententation in Wordwall and let students play with it for some time.

https://wordwall.net/embed/13a9e5ed10ba47cc8834a48af79dd09f?themeId=41&templateId=76&fontStackId=0

After that we watched the video and talked about the story.

Finally I put two sentnces on the board ‘Lucas can…’ and ‘Lucas can’t… ‘ We brainstormed different ways to finish the sentences. Eventually I distributed the handouts and everybody completed the first two columns.

The last activity was to go outside and find some other animals. Scan them with a GoogleLense, learn about them and complete the table with more information.

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Thanksgiving – The True Story

Level: B1 and up Time: 90 min

I made this lesson for my teenage group of 13-14-year-olds. It challenges some of the popular myths about Thanksgiving and is an opportunity to explore this traditional American holiday.

I started with a brainstorming activity, followed by a vocabulary presentation, reading assignment and a video that follows.

Vocabulary: https://quizlet.com/_anz6un?x=1jqt&i=sje7e

Six Native American girls school on the REAL (or not) history of Thanksgiving. https://www.teenvogue.com/video/watch/the-real-history-of-thanksgiving

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How to get rich?

Level: B1 Time: 30-45min

After creating a huge piece of content based on articles from Huffington Post and finding out that I won’t be able to share it with you guys, I got frustrated, big time… and decided that I need a little break.

I did. Couple of months of trying to figure out something new and here I am. Back in the game, with all new… Totally Inappropriate Listening Activities based on a YT show created by Truly.

They will all come in form of pdf presentations with a quizlet vocabulary set and answer sheet. You can either use them for your online or f2f classes.

The first is a story of Sativa, a 23-year-old making decent money selling pictures of her feet.

Enjoy the lesson and stay tuned for more.

QUIZLET:

https://quizlet.com/581437238/how-to-get-rich-ogfoot-flash-cards/?x=1qqt

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Perfect Attendance Pencil

Level: B1 and up

One of my personal favorite lessons on Teacher-Parent-Student roles and responsibilities.

Before the lesson: Send SS a link to this post:

https://www.instagram.com/tv/B79jz-iHDAq/?igshid=1d95kqebb5rgr

At the beginning of the lesson show your SS Attendance Award Pencil or a picture of one. Like this one here:

ołówek

Discuss with your SS:

What happened to the girl?

How does she feel about it?

How do you feel about the situation?

 

The video of Taylor went viral. As a result she was invited to The Ellen Show:

Watch the video and answer the questions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKn4naaLuqs

  • On the scale from one to ten, how mad was Taylor? Why?
  • Has Taylor ever used the eraser? Why?
  • Was this the first time Taylor got the perfect attendance pencil?
  • When did Taylor realize her pencil was missing?
  • What did Taylor get from Ellen?
  • What does Taylor want to do when she grows up? Why?
  • What does Taylor get at the end of the show?

 

Discussion: The situation rises several issues and involves lots of people. Taylor, her friend Lizzie, Taylor’s mom, teacher, school authorities.

Discuss the issues mentioned in the comments below the video:

  • To teacher: First, I want to give the teacher the biggest side-eye. Why would you bother to give a child a perfect attendance pencil if it was free for all to use? Do not give me that “sharing is caring” baloney. While I believe in teaching a child to share, boys and girls should have the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of their work. Also, they should be given the opportunity to share or to refuse. Either enforce that this is Taylor’s pencil only, or just give everyone the same pencil. Rules and structures should not be malleable.

 

  • To Taylor’s mom: I know that you are raising a beautiful daughter. I love how articulate she is. It was such a joy listening to her story. It sounds like you are raising an outstanding child. Just know that I am only commenting here as you put this story out there, and it went viral. That said, I would love it if you would stand up for her in this situation. Yes, it is nice for children to learn to be the bigger person, but it is also good for them to learn to enforce proper boundaries with others. If something has gone awry, they need to be able to rely on us for support.

 

  • To school authorities: Why do you give kids rewards for attendance? It’s like giving awards for not being ill? Or for coming to school despite feeling down or being ill? It’s discrimination!!! My son skips a day at school every fortnight because of his medical condition. Guess how he’s feeling when the perfect attendance pencils are distributed?

 

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AskGaryVee Episode 116

Level: C1 and up

That’s a tough one.

Gary’s employees asking him questions and multiple T/F answers.

Be careful! This worksheet is harder than it seems. I don’t know whether it’s the amount of business and sports or the language and speed that they speak at?  It’s just HARD to get the answers right.

But the discussion on fantasy sports is going to make it up to you.

Have fun.

Episode 116 worksheetpdf icon

Episode 116 Answerspdf icon

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