Lesson plan - Say what you want to say

LEVEL: Intermediate (B1) / Upper-intermediate (B2)

TIME: 1 hour / 1 hour 30 min.

SKILLS: Speaking / Listening / Vocabulary / Writing

MATERIAL: Clip of the video (embedded) / Computer with projector and speakers

SOURCE: Saturday Night Live - Say What You Want To Say - "Brave" - SKETCH 2015

STEPS

1. Anticipatory activities

- Divide the students in small groups of 3 ot 4.

- Write on the whiteboard "Honesty Vs Sincerity". Tell them they have 5 minutes to discuss about the differences in meaning between the two words.

- A representative of each group tell the rest of the class about their conclusion. Mini-debate if it comes up.

- Ask the students now to think about a situation in which they didn't sat what they wanted to say. They could either explain it in the small groups or to the whole class.

2. Video activity

- Tell the students they are going to see a video. In  the video there will be 8 situations, where one of the characters will say exactly what he/she wanted to say.

- Tell them you are going to stop the video just before this person says what he/she wants to say.

- They will have to discuss and predict what this person is going to say and write it on a piece of a paper.

- Each group will start with 100 points, and they can bet on their guess. If the bet is correct, they double the points they bet, if it's not, they lose the points.

- At the end of the game, the group with the most points is the winner.

3. Extra activity

- Tell the students to write/ discuss what they would have said in the situations from the video.

VIDEO

Oral comprehension - Proper nouns in popo music on the rise

LEVEL: Intermediate (B1) / Upper-intermediate (B2)

LENGHT: 2:09 min

MATERIAL: Embedded you will find the video from Youtube and the worksheet with the comprehension questions

ESL Oral comprehension - Proper Nouns in Pop Music by matxk

Lesson plan - Unbelievers by Vampire Weekend

LEVEL: Pre-intermediate (A2) / Intermediate (B1) / Upper-Intermediate (B2)

TIME: 1 hour (could be extended with speaking)

SKILLS: Listening / Vocabulary / Speaking

MATERIAL: Prezi with activities (embedded after steps) / worksheet with lyrics (embedded after steps) / computer with projector and speakers

STEPS: 

1. Introduction

Project the Prezi with the general view. Ask students if they are familiar with Vampire Weekend. Have they heard about it? Where? When? In case they haven't, ask them what kind of music do they think they play?

2. Band introduction

Project step 1 of the Prezi. Tell students they are going to watch a short introductory video about the band. Tell them they just have to try to understand as much as they can about the video.

3. Video comprehension

Project step 2 of the Prezi. Tell students they are going to watch the video again and they should try to answer the questions they see. Play the video and check answers.

4. Guessing vocabulary 

Project step 3 of the Prezi. Give students a copy of the lyrics song (worksheet embedded below) and tell them they should try to guess what word goes in each gap. They can work individually or in groups. Walk around monitoring their work.

5. Checking answers

Project step 4 of the Prezi. Tell students they should try to correct their guesses just by listening to the song in the video. Play the video.

6. Checking answers (2)

Project step 5 of the Prezi. Tell students they are going to listen to the song again, but this time they can follow the lyrics in the projection. Play the video. Ask students if they were able to fill/correct all the gaps. In case they couldn't, you can play the video again. Ask students if there's any vocabulary they don't know and provide meaning.

7. Speaking

Project step 6 of the Prezi. Students should now discuss about the questions in small groups. Then, one representative from each group explains to the rest of the class about their conclusions. You can finish with a general debate or class conversation to get to general conclusions. 

Personally, I think it is better to let students get to their own conclusions, rather than trying to give them a correct/incorrect interpretation of the song.

Lyrics Worksheet

Unbelievers

Prezi

I hope you find it useful!

Oral comprehension - Kevin Spacey interview on David Letterman

LEVEL: Intermediate (B1) / Upper-intermediate (B2)

LENGTH: 9:16 min

MATERIAL: Embedded you will find the video from Youtube and the worksheet with the comprehension questions

ESL Oral comprehension - Kevin Spacey on David Letterman