CEP Lesson Plan Template

Teacher/s: Emily Jones and Matty Espino

Level: A4
Date/Time: Wednesday, 11/12/14 10am-12pm
Goal: To continue discussing gestures and review the passive voice
Objectives (SWBAT):
Students Will Be Able To
1. review the passive sentence structure by describing pictures of a messy and then clean room
2. learn new discussion markers to manage conflict and close a discussion by labeling
expressions in groups
3. discuss how distance conveys nonverbal communication by conducting an experiment
4. infer vocabulary meaning from context by reading a passage and filling in the missing words
Theme: Beyond Words
Aim/Skill/Microskill Activity/Procedure/Stage

Interaction

Time

SS-SS

10
min.

T collects pronunciation diagnostic

worksheets
Warm Up:
Charades!

Charades Warm up!

(Weve learned that

we need a warm up
activity that students
can join as they
come in late; we
have 23 students so
there are bound to
be usually more than
5 late students every
day!)

SS will get into teams and try to get through a

set of charades cards
Rules:
One person will start and act out something (NO
SPEAKING!)
When someone guesses correctly, another
team member will take a turn at performing
Everyone must take a turn
The first team to get through all of the cards
wins!
(Reflection: Students really enjoyed this
activityat first they were reluctant to stand up
and move around, but once they started playing
they had a lot of fun trying to guess! the theme
was movies and Toy Story was actually quite
hard!)
Linking & Transitioning to rest of lesson:

[we
let
the
SS
take
a little
longe
r
beca
use
some
SS
were
late.]

Did you guys think it was easy or hard to do

charades? Why? Who was the best on your
team?

Activity 1: Passive
Review

1.1 Pre-Stage: Bring awareness to the passive

voice (Penny Urs activity)
T hands out picture of messy bedroom (Picture
(We correctly
A) and asks SS to describe the picture to their
assumed that most
partners (and write down some sentences on
of the students had
handout)
already studied the
After 3 minutes, T passes out Picture B and
passive voice; we
asks SS to describe what has changed in the
wanted to do a quick room. (and write down some sentences on
review before doing handout)
passive modals
which was the
(This was greatStudents could work at their
grammar point for
own paces and move onto the next stage when
the unit. Students
ready)
responded well to
the review and even 1.2. During Stage: Compare answers
did well at the end of T asks SS to compare their answers with
the activity where we another pair.
introduced passive
T takes some sentences and put them on the
modals [might have doc cam in order for students to see the
been done], so we structure that is common
decided that we
(Because we were running behind on time, I
wouldnt have to
skipped comparing answers in groups and did
cover so much of
error correction with the doc cam.
this in the future!)
This part of the activity was the best; students
were able to see new vocabulary, such as the
bed was made and it gave me a chance to do
quick error correction)
1.3 Post-Stage: Introducting the passive modal
form
T now asks SS to speculate about who might
have cleaned the room.
T tries to elicit modals:
The room might have been cleaned by the
childs mother.
(We again showed sentences on the doc cam

T-SS; SSSS

5
min.
[took
about
15
min.]

SS-SS; TSS; SS-T

10
min.
[This
almos
t took
20
min.]

T-SS;SS-T

2
min.
[took
over
10
min.]

Transition #2:
Excellent work
everyone! Now I
want you to think
about the most
awkward
conversation you
have ever had.

Activity 2:
Discussion
Markers
(We actually had to
skip the during and
post stages for this
activity because the
warm up and first
activity took so long.
[I DEFINTELY need
to work on timing!]

and did error correction as a class, which I think

all of the students appreciated. Also there were
some other expressions being used [Maybe his
girlfriend cleaned the room.] and we talked
about the differences between the different
tenses. I love Penny Urs simple, but effective
activities!!)
Tangible Outcome:
sentences in the passive form; use of modals
with passive sentences
Teacher Feedback:
T will provide corrective feedback when
necessary to fix FORM (the focus of the lesson)

2.1 Pre-Stage: Brainstorming

T asks SS to think of controversial topics
Why are they controversial? How do you feel if
these kinds of subjects come up? How do you
talk with someone who has different opinions
from you?
(students seemed glad to have a chance to talk
about controversial topicsespecially those
who are in academia or law! )

2.2. During Stage: Discussion markers

SS open to pg. 49 and read the paragraph
about how conflicts might appear
We decided to move T and students read over the different
this part of the
expressions
activity to the next
SS in pairs do p. 50 #5
class when we have Compare answers
a discussion about
controversial topics; 2.3 Post-Stage: Have a discussion
doing the practice
T tells Ss to discuss the topic one of the topics
with expressions
from #6 and write down some of their ideas in a
right beforehand will graphic format
be useful and in any If they finish early, have them move onto the
case we needed to
next topic
move onto the next
part of the lesson.)
Tangible Outcome:

SS-SS

5
min.

T-SS; SSSS

5
min.

SS-SS

15
min.

answers in book

Transition to #3:
Great discussion
everyone! Lets try
an experiement!

Activity 3:
Conducting a
Social Experiment

(Great activity! The

students seemed
weirded out at first
because they were
unsure about why
they had to stand so
close to one
another, but it all
made sense at the
very end!!)

Teacher Feedback:
T provides corrective feedback

3.1 Pre-Stage:
T states, I want to try an experiment. T pairs
SS and asks them to come up with a neutral
topic to discuss. Ex. What are you planning to
do this weekend?
(students were interested in coming up with
neutral topics right after talking about
controversial topicshowever it was a bit hard
to do this quickly as their brains had to do a
180. Perhaps next time we could transition by
handing out a bunch of different topics and ask
students to categorize the topics as
controversial or neutral; if students finished
early we could ask them to come up with
additional neutral topics. I think having a
transition like this might be a fun and student
centered way of redoing this activity in the
future!)

T-SS

5 min

T-SS, SSSS

10
min

3.2. During Stage:

Part 1: SS will stand next to their partner. Talk
to each other about any neutral topic. T will time
for 2-3 minutes and ask then stop the
discussion. SS will not move. T will say, This
distance should feel comfortable to both of you.
Does it?
T-SS, SSSS, SS-T
Part 2: S will take one half-step toward the other
person and continue talking for another few
minutes. T will stop discussion. With their
partner, SS discuss how they felt talking at this
distance.
Part 3: SS will take one full step back and
continue talking for another few minutes. T will

5 min

ask SS to stop and discuss how the extra

distance affected their feelings and the way in
which they used their voices and eyes.
Transition to
Activity #4: Great!
So weve put our
mindset in the idea
of spatial distance.
Space between
people is another
way we can show
nonverbal
communication. We
are going to take a
look at a reading
that discusses this.

(Students had a lot of fun during each part!!

They were not happy to have to be so close to
one another and when they were far apart they
spoke louder and used a lot more hand
gestures. All in all it was fun!)
3.3 Post-Stage:
T will lead a short debrief of the experiment.
(I think next time we could have a worksheet
and have the students debrief in groups; this
would reduce teacher-fronting an activity.)
Teacher Feedback:
T will provide corrective feedback if necessary

Activity 4:
Space Speaks Inferring
Vocabulary from
Context

(I think the connection between this article and

the previous activity should have been more
T-SS
explicitly linked; students didnt seem to
understand why they did the previous activity
and then were going to do a vocabulary activity.
Perhaps we could have even switched the two
activities so they could practice what they read SS-SS
about? Or we could have had students first read
for the gist and try to connect the previous
activity to this one?)
4.1 Pre-Stage:
T will distribute reading. T will provide some
background on the articles style. T explains
directions.
4.2. During Stage:
Part 1:
In pairs, SS will read the article together and fillin-the-blanks with a word that they think best fits
the reading.
Part 2:
T will distribute vocabulary check words. Pairs

5 min

will decide if the word they came up with have a

similar meaning to the vocabulary words.
Part 3:
If SS finish early, they can complete #3 on page
52.
(I really liked this activity, even if the students
seemed to be a bit frustrated at times. However,
they did an AMAZING job at guessing
vocabulary!! Some students even got one of the
Transition to Wrap words, backs up and even got some of the
Up: For your
other words after we pointed out parts of
homework, I want
speech [i.e. where the word override was
you to go back to the supposed to be I helped students realize that a
blog post and look at verb should be there and they picked help/
your peers
beat, which were close in meaning!
sentences. Does it
explain the meaning I think we should have done more cloze
in context? Make
exercises like this with the students so they
suggested edits to
would have been used to this skill ahead of
the sentences by
time.)
adding more
information. In
4.3 Post-Stage:
addition, please
T shows the vocabulary and meanings on PPT.
respond to another
T explains that SS have used context to try and
students critical
define meaning. If we are not sure about a
thinking response. words meaning, we can often take it out and
replace it with our own word. But in order for
this to be successful, we need to use context.
(Students seemed to respond well to this
explanation and seemed quite proud of their
inferencing abilities. However, I dont know if
they actually retained the vocabulary words in
this reading activity. I think we need to do more
vocabulary practice/assessment in the future!)
Tangible Outcome:
Space Speaks Reading
Teacher Feedback:
T provides corrective feedback

Wrap Up:
Homework

Teachers hand back tests; asks if there are any

questions
Collects tests once more
Lesson Plan Evaluation Procedure
Exit Tickets (Socrative)
(The exit tickets we have been receiving via
Socrative are being responded to less and less;
in the future I might make it mandatoryi.e. you
will be counted absent unless you fill one out or
you will lose points for homework. I heard from
a friend in the English Education program that
her coworker does that and always gets exit
tickets back!)
Homework due:
Workbook pg. 26 #4
Blog Post Peer Edits and Responses
(Not too much homework this time; students
complained and we listened!!)

Materials
Slips of paper with movies written on them for charades x 6 (one for each group)
Power points (2)
Pictures of messy room/clean room x 11 (taken from Ur, P. (1988). Grammar practice activities:
A practical guide for teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.)
Reading handouts with words missing
Anticipated Problems & Suggested Solutions:
Ts go over time limit (online timer/ppt timer/timer)
Tech not set up or breaks (print out slides)
Contingency Plans (what you will do if you finish early, etc.):
Start on homework ahead of time; ask students to write questions they have on index cards and
share with another group
Post-Lesson Reflections:
Overall, I think this was a great lesson! The students had to get up on their feet a lot (first for
charades then for the third activity Conducting a Social Experiment), which I think brought a lot
of energy into the class.

The grammar in this unit is a bit strangewho really understands how we used the past
progressive passive with a modal?? The white cloth could have been being used to indicate
mourning is such a bizarre and unusual sentence. Because of this, we decided to assign
homework ahead of time and if students had questions, we would then delve more into the
topic. We felt that this would reduce teacher-talk time that can be a problem in grammar
instruction as well as not make this grammar point seem more salient than it actually is in
normal English usage.
All in all, students practiced mostly speaking and reading today; however, there was some
listening with the speaking activity and writing associated with the grammar activity. It was a
good and balanced class and I think the students left feeling accomplished, as did Matty and I!
This also reminds me why I love playing short games at the beginning of classI think it always
sets a positive mood!