giving a presentation esl lesson plan

Business English Lesson plan- Giving a Presentation (ESA Framework)

Type of Lesson: Integrated skills (Listening integrated to speaking, pronunciation and vocabulary using authentic material. Theme: giving presentations)

Aims: To identify the characteristics of a good and bad presentation To introduce vocabulary related to presentations To review sentence stress and intonation patterns for effective presentations.

Outcome: By the end of the lesson, students will be able to give a sales presentation about their companies’ new product.

Read: 5 Great Activities to Use with Your Business English Students!

Read: How to Conduct a Needs Analysis for Your Business English Class

Assumptions: Students have a wide range of vocabulary related to the business field. They are able to articulate full sentences using complex and compound sentences. They are aware of how important intonation is when delivering a message. They are able to differentiate intonation patterns. They will already know many adjectives that are used to describe the product they sell at their company, as they will have used them in their own language while performing sales pitches. They have prior experience in giving presentations in their own language and have given presentations in previous ESL classes. They are familiar with the structure of a presentation: introduction, overview, state points, state results and conclusions, summarize, and close.

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Students background information: Students are to give a sales presentation about their companies’ new product at a business conference. They are well established sales people in Japan and this will be their first time presenting their product in an overseas environment.

Anticipated Problems and Solutions: Students may not be able to recall some ‘great speakers’. In this case, the teacher will suggest people such as Martin Luther King Jr., Steve Jobs, etc. They may have difficulty using proper intonation in certain phrases; this will be solved by demonstration and drilling. They may also have problems with some pronunciation in the intonation exercise. The teacher will be around to assist students with their individual needs.

Aids/Materials: YouTube video “Enhancing Your Presentation Skills”; a vocabulary presentation worksheet; stress and intonation worksheet; Steve Jobs iphone 2007 presentation YouTube Time: approx. 150 minutes

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Aim: to introduce the topic of giving presentations and to outline skills and characteristics that lead to a good presentation. Techniques used: questionnaire; discussion; brainstorming Skills: speaking and listening Interactive Pattern: SS Time: 10 minutes

Aids/Materials: handouts with questions/board

Put students into pairs and have them discuss the following questions:

1.                  What are the characteristics of a great speech/presentation? 2.                  Who are the greatest speakers that you can think of? 3.                  Who do you need to give presentations to as a part of your job? What are they about?

Once students have finished discussing in pairs, have an entire class feedback and have students brainstorm the characteristics of a great speech are.  (Examples of ideas that will be elicited: eye contact, clear voice, positive body language, etc.).

STUDY – Business English Lesson Plan

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Step 1: introduce words and phrases related to giving presentations Techniques: Gap-filling Skills: Reading and speaking Interactive Patterns: T-S; SS Time: 5-10 minutes

Aids/Materials: Vocabulary: Presentation Language worksheet.

Students will be given a ‘Vocabulary: Presentation Language’ worksheet that uses words and phrases suitable for presentations. They are to work in pairs in order to fill in the blanks of the passage. After students have completed this activity, the teacher will take it up as a whole class and discuss any vocabulary words they were unsure of.

Vocabulary: Presentation Language

Complete the following presentation excerpts using the words below.

after that                     finally                          illustrate                                  outline to start with                 then                             describe                                   specifically purpose                        sum up                         thank                                       tell you

Good morning, everybody. I hope you are all doing well today and I’d like to _______ you all for being here. Today I am here to __________ about our latest product, and more _________ about how it works and what it does. I’d also like to __________ the products’ features and __________ inform you about where you can get it and how. ____________, I’d like to briefly __________ our current marketing policy in Canada. ________, I’ll __________ some of the problems we have encountered in our market share. ___________, I’ll ________ our progress this year and continue on with our main _______ for being here; the product.

Answer Key: thank, tell you, specifically, illustrate, finally, to start with, describe, then, outline, after that, sum up, purpose

Step 2: To identify how important intonation is in delivering a sound presentation Techniques: Elicitation Skills: Listening and speaking Interactive Patterns: T-S Time: 5 minutes Aids/Materials: Vocabulary: Presentation Language worksheet

The teacher will read the excerpt twice. T will ask the students to listen carefully and identify the differences. The first time, T will read it using proper sentence stress (stressing content words: nouns, main verbs, adjectives, adverbs), intonation and tone of voice. The second time, T will read it in a monotone voice. Then T will elicit the difference and which one is more effective and why: T: “Which speech was more effective?” S: “The first one” T: “Why?” S: (Possible answers) “You used expression, your voice changed, you sounded enthusiastic. In the second reading, your sounded dull, boring.”

Read: How to Use the Communicative Approach

Read: How to Use Task-based Learning

ACTIVATE – Business English Lesson Plan

Aim: Practice intonation patterns Techniques: reading aloud Skills: speaking and pronunciation Interactive Patterns: SS Time: 10 minutes

Aids/Materials: “Good and Bad Stress and Intonation” from UsingEnglish.com

The teacher will hand out the worksheet “Good and Bad Stress and Intonation”. Students will work in partners to practice saying the sixteen sentences with both good and bad intonation. The back of the worksheet provides helpful tips in how to express the sentences in the best and worst ways possible. Once students have finished practicing with a partner, they will go over each sentence as a whole class. The teacher will correct them where necessary

Step 1: Aim: to identify characteristics of effective presentations. Technique: note-taking, listen for main ideas Skills: listening and speaking Interactive patterns: S and SS Time: 10-15 minutes Aids/Materials: YouTube video “Enhancing Your Presentation Skills- Killer Presentations” by Doug Jeffries. (about 7:18 minutes)

The teacher will play the video twice to ensure students have a full understanding of the content. Students are responsible for noting at least five presentation skills that Doug Jeffries mentions in the video (Making your audience comfortable, establishing eye contact, ‘power of the pause’, body language/gestures, effective content). They will then go over and discuss the importance of each point as a whole class. For example:

T: “Why is establishing eye contact important when giving a presentation?” S: “It engages the viewer and allows them to know that you are speaking directly to them”

The teacher will now ask students if they know who Steve Jobs was and what he was responsible for.

T will tell the students that they will now watch a presentation by Steve Jobs and they have to discuss the following questions:

–          Can you identify any of the presentation skills described by Doug Jeffries in Steve Jobs’ video?

–          What makes Steve Jobs’ iphone 2007 launch presentation effective? (Possible answers: visuals, timing of speech accompanied by visuals, clear voice, confidence, knowledge of product).

–          How does he keep the audience engaged? (Possible answers: movement, gestures, tone/pitch, humour, repetition (“re-invent, revolutionary”)

T will ask students to take a closer look at Steve Jobs’ presentation. T will direct them to identify any words they think made his presentation effective; words he repeated, words that they think helped to describe/promote his product. Students should pick out certain adjectives such as revolutionary, life-changing, re-invent, magic, etc. T will write students’ answers on the board and then ask them to think of other vocabulary words they could use to sell a product, focusing on a product that the company they work for sells. “If you were to sell your company’s new product in a presentation like Steve Jobs’, what type of words would you use to engage the audience and make them want to buy your product? Come up with as many adjectives as you can to promote your product.” Students will compile an individual list. Once they have finished their lists, they will discuss their adjectives together as a class. T will write their ideas on the board, adding to the list that we compiled from Steve Jobs’ presentation and give the students time to copy any of the adjectives that they wish to use for their presentations into their notes.

Aim: Students will create a presentation with the assistance of ICT tools (PowerPoint/Camtasia) to sell a product to their classmates using appropriate vocabulary and body language. Techniques: collaborative writing and discussion Skills: Speaking, listening, reading and writing Aids/Materials: computers with Camtasia program and Microsoft PowerPoint Interactive Pattern: SSS Time: approx. 50 min.

For the final stage of the lesson, T will tell students that they are going to create a presentation, much like the one they viewed in the Steve Jobs video, using ICT tools (Camtasia or Powerpoint) to sell a product of their choice. The product must be something they are fully aware of as they will not have much time to research.

T will briefly go over the main stages of a presentation. Students’ presentation must  follow this format: introduction, overview, state point, state results, summarize, and close.

Other points to remember to use in their presentations are: -use of vocabulary (adjectives and phrases) to describe the product -body language, gestures and intonation -synchronization of their speech with the slideshow presentation

After each student presents, the rest of the class will give them feedback regarding their presentation (both good and bad) and what they need to work on for a real life sales presentation scenario.

Adapted from lesson plan by 120-hour TEFL certificate graduate.

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• Professional development
• Planning lessons and courses

Student presentations

In this article I would like to give you a few tips and some advice on what I've learned from helping students prepare and deliver presentations.

• Why I get students to do presentations
• Syllabus fit
• Planning a presentation lesson
• Classroom Management

Why I get students to do presentations Presentations are a great way to have students practise all language systems areas (vocabulary, grammar, discourse and phonology) and skills (speaking, reading, writing and listening). They also build confidence, and presenting is a skill that most people will need in the world of work. I find that students who are good presenters are better communicators all round, since they are able to structure and express their ideas clearly.

• Presentation skills are extremely useful both in and outside the classroom. After completing a project, a presentation is a channel for students to share with others what they have learned. It is also a chance to challenge and expand on their understanding of the topic by having others ask questions. And in the world of work, a confident presenter is able to inform and persuade colleagues effectively.
• Presentations can also form a natural part of task based learning. By focussing on a particular language point or skill, the presentation is a very practical way to revise and extend book, pair and group work. The audience can also be set a task, for example, a set of questions to answer on the presentation, which is a way of getting students to listen to each other.

Syllabus fit Normally the presentation will come towards the end of a lesson or series of lessons that focus on a particular language or skill area. It is a type of freer practice. This is because the students need to feel relatively confident about what they are doing before they stand up and do it in front of other people. If I have been teaching the past simple plus time phrases to tell a story, for example, I give my students plenty of controlled and semi controlled practice activities, such as gapfills, drills and information swaps before I ask them to present on, say, an important event in their country's history, which involves much freer use of the target grammar point.

Planning a presentation lesson Normally a presentation lesson will have an outline like this:

• Revision of key language areas
• Example presentation, which could be from a textbook or given by the teacher
• Students are given a transcript or outline of the presentation
• Students identify key stages of the example presentation – greeting, introduction, main points in order of importance, conclusion
• Focus on linking and signalling words ('Next…', 'Now I'd like you to look at…', etc.). Students underline these in the transcript/place them in the correct order
• Students are put into small groups and write down aims
• Students then write down key points which they order, as in the example
• Students decide who is going to say what and how
• Students prepare visuals (keep the time for this limited as too many visuals become distracting)
• Students practise at their tables
• Students deliver the presentations in front of the class, with the audience having an observation task to complete (see 'Assessment' below)
• The teacher takes notes for feedback later

It is important that the students plan and deliver the presentations in groups at first, unless they are extremely confident and/or fluent. This is because:

• Shy students cannot present alone
• Students can support each other before, during and after the presentation
• Getting ready for the presentation is a practice task in itself
• When you have a large class, it takes a very long time for everyone to present individually!

I find it's a good idea to spend time training students in setting clear aims. It is also important that as teachers we think clearly about why we are asking students to present.

Aims Presentations normally have one or more of the following aims:

• To inform/ raise awareness of an important issue
• To persuade people to do something
• Form part of an exam, demonstrating public speaking/presentation skills in a first or second language

I set students a task where they answer these questions:

• Why are you making the presentation?
• What do you want people to learn?
• How are you going to make it interesting?

Let's say I want to tell people about volcanoes. I want people to know about why volcanoes form and why they erupt. This would be an informative/awareness-raising presentation. So by the end, everyone should know something new about volcanoes, and they should be able to tell others about them. My plan might look like this:

• Introduction - what is a volcano? (2 minutes)
• Types of volcano (5 minutes)
• Volcanoes around the world (2 minutes)
• My favourite volcano (2 minutes)
• Conclusion (2-3 minutes)
• Questions (2 minutes)

Classroom Management I find that presentation lessons pass very quickly, due the large amount of preparation involved. With a class of 20 students, it will probably take at least 3 hours. With feedback and follow-up tasks, it can last even longer. I try to put students into groups of 3 or 4 with classes of up to 20 students, and larger groups of 5 or 6 with classes up to 40. If you have a class larger than 40, it would be a good idea to do the presentation in a hall or even outside.

Classroom management can become difficult during a presentations lesson, especially during the final presenting stage, as the presenters are partly responsible for managing the class! There are a few points I find effective here:

• Training students to stand near people who are chatting and talk 'through' the chatter, by demonstration
• Training students to stop talking if chatter continues, again by demonstration
• Asking for the audience's attention ('Can I have your attention please?')
• Setting the audience an observation task, which is also assessed by the teacher
• Limiting the amount of time spent preparing visuals
• Arranging furniture so everyone is facing the front

Most of these points are self-explanatory, but I will cover the observation task in more detail in the next section, which deals with assessment. 

Assessment The teacher needs to carefully consider the assessment criteria, so that s/he can give meaningful feedback. I usually run through a checklist that covers:

• Level - I can't expect Elementary students to use a wide range of tenses or vocabulary, for example, but I'd expect Advanced students to have clear pronunciation and to use a wide range of vocabulary and grammar
• Age - Younger learners do not (normally) have the maturity or general knowledge of adults, and the teacher's expectations need to reflect this
• Needs - What kind of students are they? Business English students need to have much more sophisticated communication skills than others. Students who are preparing for an exam need to practise the skills that will be assessed in the exam.

I write a list of language related points I'm looking for. This covers:

• Range / accuracy of vocabulary
• Range / accuracy of grammar
• Presentation / discourse management- is it well structured? What linking words are used and how?
• Use of visuals- Do they help or hinder the presentation?
• Paralinguistic features

'Paralinguistics' refers to non-verbal communication. This is important in a presentation because eye contact, directing your voice to all parts of the room, using pitch and tone to keep attention and so on are all part of engaging an audience.

I find it's a good idea to let students in on the assessment process by setting them a peer observation task. The simplest way to do this is to write a checklist that relates to the aims of the lesson. A task for presentations on major historical events might have a checklist like this:

• Does the presenter greet the audience? YES/NO
• Does the presenter use the past tense? YES/NO

And so on. This normally helps me to keep all members of the audience awake. To be really sure, though, I include a question that involves personal response to the presentation such as 'What did you like about this presentation and why?'. If working with young learners, it's a good idea to tell them you will look at their answers to the observation task. Otherwise they might simply tick random answers!

Conclusion Presentations are a great way to practise a wide range of skills and to build the general confidence of your students. Due to problems with timing, I would recommend one lesson per term, building confidence bit by bit throughout the year. In a school curriculum this leaves time to get through the core syllabus and prepare for exams.

Presentations - Adult students

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Business Skills Bank: Giving Presentations

By Tim Bowen

This Business skills lesson plan by Tim Bowen presents common features of presentations and practises useful language for putting together and giving presentations.

Lesson length: 60-75 mins

Materials: Worksheets 1-5

Subsidiary aims: Listening (or reading) for specific information, discussion of what makes a good presentation.

Business Skills Bank: Giving presentations—Worksheets

Business skills bank: giving presentations—teacher's notes, presentations part 1, presentations part 2.

• British English
• Business / ESP
• Intermediate
• Lesson Plan / Teacher's Notes
• Pre-Intermediate
• Printable Worksheet
• Up to 90 mins
• Upper-Intermediate
• Whole Class

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Presentation skills: hooking the audience

Level A2 / B1

Topic Business

Type Business English

Lesson plan overview

This pre-intermediate and intermediate Business English lesson plan is dedicated to the topic of presentations . It is the first of a series of lessons about presentation skills. This lesson is focused on different techniques used to hook the audience at the beginning of a presentation. Reading and useful language: After an initial discussion about presentations, students read about 5 different ways to grab the audience’s attention (rhetorical questions, shocking statistics, quotes, storytelling, using the words “imagine” and “what if” and a few examples for each type of hook. Then students are given 15 phrases, which they need to put into the correct category according to the type of hook the phrase is. Video: Next students move on to the listening task. They take a look at the 4-step formula that is going to be mentioned in the video and talk about what the correct order of the steps is. Next, they watch the first part of the video “How to start your presentation: 4 step formula for a killer presentation” and check their answers. After that they work out how the speaker used her formula when starting her talk and watch the second part of the video to check their answers. After watching, students discuss their last presentation, the technique they used to hook the audience and how they could improve it. Lastly, students are asked to prepare the intro for one of the presentation topics given. For additional speaking practice, you can use the printable set of conversation cards.

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Teacher’s lesson plan

Student’s worksheet

Student’s interactive PDF

Conversation cards PDF

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Delivering presentations

LESSON SET OVERVIEW

With this lesson set, your students will:

• learn dos and don’ts of presenting ,
• discuss different structures and types of presentations (e.g. elevator pitch);
• learn and practise signposting language (e.g. to start, elaborate, make a connection, recap, deviate),
• watch a video about virtual presentations ,
• consolidate their knowledge by doing a few revision exercises and preparing mini presentations .

These three lessons were designed to introduce  language useful for going through business presentation  and practise using it in controlled scenarios to finally  do presentations on different topics  in the final lesson.

This is a lesson set. Use the lessons in the set in the suggested order. Learn more about sets here.

Each lesson in the set is also a standalone lesson.

How to nail that presentation

The first lesson in this set includes a video about how to nail a virtual presentation . Apart from the tips, in this lesson students also learn the types of presentations such as an elevator pitch, team briefing, roadmap presentation , etc. and their structures.

Moving through your presentation

Students learn the phrases to start, elaborate, make a connection, recap, deviate , etc. You can revise the vocabulary and the tips from the first lesson by encouraging students to use them in the first discussion question in ex. 1 (slide 3) , as well as in ex. 8 and ex. 11 (slide 45 and slide 51) of this lesson.

Presentation: putting skills into action

In the last lesson of this set, students consolidate their knowledge by doing a few revision exercises (ex. 1-4 / slides 3-12) and preparing mini presentations based on the information they receive.

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Revising conditionals

With this lesson set, your students will review three types of conditional sentences during 2 lessons. Each lesson in the set requires some pre-class student work (watching a video or reading an article).

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• Speaking exams
• Typical speaking tasks

Oral presentation

Giving an oral presentation as part of a speaking exam can be quite scary, but we're here to help you. Watch two students giving presentations and then read the tips carefully. Which tips do they follow? Which ones don’t they follow?

Instructions

Watch the video of two students doing an oral presentation as part of a speaking exam. Then read the tips below.

Melissa: Hi, everyone! Today I would like to talk about how to become the most popular teen in school.

Firstly, I think getting good academic results is the first factor to make you become popular since, having a good academic result, your teacher will award you in front of your schoolmates. Then, your schoolmates will know who you are and maybe they would like to get to know you because they want to learn something good from you.

Secondly, I think participating in school clubs and student unions can help to make you become popular, since after participating in these school clubs or student union, people will know who you are and it can help you to make friends all around the school, no matter senior forms or junior forms.

In conclusion, I think to become the most popular teen in school we need to have good academic results and also participate in school clubs and student union. Thank you!

Kelvin: Good evening, everyone! So, today I want to talk about whether the sale of cigarettes should be made illegal.

As we all know, cigarettes are not good for our health, not only oneself but also other people around. Moreover, many people die of lung cancer every year because of smoking cigarettes.

But, should the government make it illegal? I don’t think so, because Hong Kong is a place where people can enjoy lots of freedom and if the government banned the sale of cigarettes, many people would disagree with this and stand up to fight for their freedom.

Moreover, Hong Kong is a free market. If there's such a huge government intervention, I think it’s not good for Hong Kong’s economy.

So, if the government wants people to stop smoking cigarettes, what should it do? I think the government can use other administrative ways to do so, for example education and increasing the tax on cigarettes. Also, the government can ban the smokers smoking in public areas. So, this is the end of my presentation. Thank you.

It’s not easy to give a good oral presentation but these tips will help you. Here are our top tips for oral presentations.

• Use the planning time to prepare what you’re going to say. 
• If you are allowed to have a note card, write short notes in point form.
• Use more formal language.
• Use short, simple sentences to express your ideas clearly.
• Pause from time to time and don’t speak too quickly. This allows the listener to understand your ideas. Include a short pause after each idea.
• Speak clearly and at the right volume.
• Have your notes ready in case you forget anything.
• Practise your presentation. If possible record yourself and listen to your presentation. If you can’t record yourself, ask a friend to listen to you. Does your friend understand you?
• Make your opinions very clear. Use expressions to give your opinion .
• Look at the people who are listening to you.
• Write out the whole presentation and learn every word by heart. 
• Write out the whole presentation and read it aloud.
• Use very informal language.
• Only look at your note card. It’s important to look up at your listeners when you are speaking.

Useful language for presentations

Explain what your presentation is about at the beginning:

I’m going to talk about ... I’d like to talk about ... The main focus of this presentation is ...

Use these expressions to order your ideas:

First of all, ... Firstly, ... Then, ... Secondly, ... Next, ... Finally, ... Lastly, ... To sum up, ... In conclusion, ...

Use these expressions to add more ideas from the same point of view:

In addition, ... What’s more, ... Also, ... Added to this, ...

To introduce the opposite point of view you can use these words and expressions:

However, ... On the other hand, ... Then again, ...

Example presentation topics

• Violent computer games should be banned.
• The sale of cigarettes should be made illegal.
• Homework should be limited to just two nights a week.
• Should school students be required to wear a school uniform?
• How to become the most popular teen in school.
• Dogs should be banned from cities.

Check your language: ordering - parts of a presentation

Check your understanding: grouping - useful phrases, worksheets and downloads.

Do you think these tips will help you in your next speaking exam? Remember to tell us how well you do in future speaking exams!  

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How to Make a Lesson Plan for Teaching English (The Definitive Guide)

How can you build effective lessons and feel in control of the class?

Lesson plans are essential to planning and ultimately giving great ESL lessons.

But isn’t making lesson plans long and arduous? Well… not if you do things the right way!

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In this article, you will learn to make a lesson plan for teaching English from scratch that is both effective and won’t eat up all of your time and energy!

Can You Teach Without a Lesson Plan?

How to create a lesson plan from scratch, essential parts to include in an esl lesson plan, how to structure an esl lesson, useful tips for lesson planning, example lesson plan.

The short answer is yes, you can teach a lesson without a plan. However…

You shouldn’t!

With one-to-one students, you usually have more freedom. If things don’t go quite right you can usually just keep talking and keep the flow going while working out what to do next.

In fact, I have a few students who just want to practise their free conversation and I just turn up and talk for an hour without anything planned.

However, for the majority of students (especially groups), not planning a lesson is not an option.

You need a clear idea of what you want your students to learn and how you are going to help them achieve that goal. The only way to do this is with a lesson plan.

Remember that you may think you’re saving time by not planning anything (or planning minimally) but you’ll regret it when you are in the middle of a stressful, unplanned lesson.

As Benjamin Franklin once said,

“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”

Does it matter which tool you use to create your lesson plan?

Not really, no.

The important thing is that you can easily and quickly create your plan, make adjustments (if necessary) and bring it to class with you.

Use Pen & Paper

This is the low-tech option but still popular, especially if you can’t get access to a computer.

You also have the advantage that you don’t have to worry about making a printout or bringing a laptop with you to class etc.

Use Word Processing Software

You can use Microsoft Word or any other popular application you would use for writing anything else.

Simply type it up and then either print a copy at the end or find some way of bringing it to class (laptop, mobile phone, classroom computer, etc.)

Use an Online Storage System

I started using Google Drive for my lesson plans a few years ago and haven’t gone back since!

The documents app has everything I need to type up my lessons and I know that everything is stored online which makes it easy to access.

Think About Presentation

Bear in mind that you should think about who will be looking at your plan. If you are working in a school or with an assistant then it is likely that others will see it.

Make sure it is neat enough that others can understand it and maybe spend some time on the presentation and making it look pretty. 

However, if you are a freelance teacher then presentation doesn’t matter so much. As long you can make out what’s written and can follow it easily, you can have it look however you want!

Once you have decided on your tool to make your lesson plan, you then need to focus on what you actually will include in your plan.

Once you have the right tool for the job it’s important to focus on what you will include in your lesson plan. Some of these can be optional but pay attention to the essentials that will be marked.

In theory, you can do these in any order you want. However, going through in the order provided here will make your life a lot easier.

Parts of a Lesson Plan

• Date and time
• Class and Student Name, Number of Students
• Lesson Aims
• Lesson Duration
• Lesson Activities

Bonus Activities

• Resources Needed

Here’s how a simple lesson plan template could look like:

Date and Time

It may seem trivial but you want to make sure you have the right lesson plan for the right lesson.

Get into the habit of including date and time to avoid confusion and turning up to class with the wrong plan!

This is also useful when the lesson plan needs to be filed after class (e.g. in a school).

Class and Student Name

Again, it comes down to making sure you are matching the right plan to the right class. This also helps you visualise your learners as you are making your lesson plan.

Number of Students

This one isn’t important if you just teach one-to-one lessons (obviously). However, if you are teaching group classes then the number of students in your class will need to be taken into consideration when planning activities.

Lesson Aims (Essential)

Ask yourself:

“What do I want my students to do at the end of this class that they couldn’t do before?”

This is your lesson aim and is one of the most important considerations when designing a lesson plan.

This can be seen as “What is the point of this class?”.

For vocabulary lessons, the lesson aim may be a list of words or maybe a certain concept if teaching a grammar lesson.

Whatever the reason is, make a note of it and always keep it in mind when you make any other decisions about the lesson plan.

Lesson Duration (Essential)

How long do you have to do the lesson?

In order to effectively plan your activities in class, you need to know how much time you have to work with.

Lesson Activities (Essential)

Create a list of every activity you plan to do in class. This needs to be precise and include things such as warm up , free conversation, explaining homework at the end, etc.

State how long each activity will take in minutes.

Obviously it is unlikely you will be able to stick to this exactly, things change and you need to go with the flow. However, try to stick as closely as you can to it and you will find your life will be much easier.

It doesn’t need to be said but, this needs to be done after your lesson aims, as they will dictate what activities will be appropriate for that class.

As well as planning your lesson activities, it’s a good idea to include some bonus activities that can be done in case you finish the class early.

You don’t want to run out of planned activities halfway through a class and have to improvise a class to a room of 30 students!

Get a couple of backup activities planned and take them to each class. A small amount of planning now will give you peace of mind in the long run.

Resources Needed (Essential)

Make a list of everything you need and pay attention to the details. 

As well as noting down that you need printouts for that crossword, did you think about whether the students have pens or will you need to bring them? Do you have backups of lesson materials ? A backup USB drive of the presentation etc?

Be prepared with all of this because there’s nothing worse than having to run out of class 5 minutes in because you forgot something small!

Ok so we know all of the details needed for the lesson plan but… how do we actually structure the activities in the class?

This is very much dependent on the type of class you are teaching and your style. As I’m teaching mostly one-to-one advanced students and my students require different things, my lesson plans vary quite a bit.

However, for “traditional” classes (groups from beginner to intermediate level) you will likely want to follow the classic PPP model which is mentioned extensively in TEFL courses.

What is PPP?

PPP is an acronym for p resentation, p ractice, and p roduction.

It is a popular model for teaching foreign languages and is one of the most popular teaching models used in TEFL courses.

Let’s look at each section in more detail with 5 great ideas for each!

Presentation

In our first section, presentation , we show the students something. It could be:

Ideas for Presentation

• A short, fictional story
• An object (a piece of fruit, a toy, etc.)
• A roleplayed conversation between the teacher and the assistant
• A news story

It could be anything, as long as it can stimulate a discussion about what you want to teach in the class. 

For example, if I want to teach the past simple tense vs the past continuous, then I could find a story that uses both of these and highlight them.

In the next section practice , we give students a chance to use the new concept in a controlled environment. We could use:

Ideas for Practice

• Gap-fill exercises (a sentence with a word missing that a student has to fill)
• Sentence correction (students find the mistakes in an incorrect sentence)
• Sentence rearrange (students have to put the jumbled words of a sentence in the right order)
• Synonym matching (students have to match a word with its synonym)
• Word select (again, there’s a gap in a sentence but there are a selection of words to choose from)

The idea is that students can play with the new concept but they still have the “training wheels” on.

The final stage, production , is much freer and allows the student to use the new concept with less help. Think of exercises like: 

Ideas for Production

• Writing an essay (set an essay question; can be very good for homework assignments, too)
• Free conversation (split students into pairs and have them talk freely while incorporating the new concept)
• Asking questions (either ask the students yourself or split them into groups)
• Roleplays (split students into pairs and give them roles to act out)
• Information exchange (split students into pairs and have them find out certain information from the other)

This section is usually the most challenging as the students have much less support compared to the practice stage. However, it is essential for preparing students to use these new concepts in the real world.

It’s Better to Overplan

When you are first starting out it is much better to over-plan everything.

Where will the students be sat? How long will it take to hand out the exercise sheets? Will you allow time for questions?

Start by overplanning and as you get more comfortable teaching, you can start taking out things that you don’t feel you need.

Don’t Reinvent the Wheel

There are plenty of pre-existing lesson plans out there just begging for you to use.

If your school or establishment has its own then you can use those and adapt them. 

Have a look online for any free or paid downloadable lesson plans and even share them with other teachers.

You can keep these lesson plans as but you will likely want to tweak them to fit your class. 

The point is, why struggle when the work is already done for you?

Browse our section of ESL teacher resources for lesson plans, worksheets, and other printables.

Include Lots of Student Activities

Make sure to include plenty of activities that get the students involved. 

It’s difficult to write a lesson where you are talking for an hour straight and still managing to keep your students hooked and learning well.

When you include more student activities you find it’s easier to write the lesson, reduces teacher talk time and your students are more likely to learn effectively.

Make a Template

Once you have a lesson plan design that works, you can then use that as a template for the next lesson plan.

This can be a big timesaver as you don’t have to make everything from scratch each time.

Make Backups

Make sure you have a backup in case you lose your main plan. I used to keep digital copies of my lesson plans on my mobile phone so that I could check that in case anything happened.

Also, make sure your assistants have their own copy of the plan so they know what should be happening at each step in the class.

Practise the Activities

It’s especially important to practise the activities if it’s the first time doing them. As well as being able to perform the task properly in class, it allows you to see how long it will take.

This timing is important when planning your lessons as it allows you to be more precise with organising the timing of the activities and have a smoother flowing lesson.

Don’t Skip the Warmup

Whether you are teaching one-to-one or a room full of students, you shouldn’t skip the warmup. This is a chance to prepare the students for the lesson and flow naturally into the topic of the day.

Make sure to factor this into your plan. For larger classes, you may way to keep things a little more controlled and spend one or two minutes on the warmup.

For one-to-one classes, I usually aim for around 5-10 minutes as it allows me to personalise things a little more and build rapport. 

The important thing though is this needs to be built into the timing of the lesson plan!

Need ideas? Read our posts on warm-up activities and icebreaker activities .

Make Room for a Review Section

I have found it to be vital to include review sections in class.

A lot of language learning is a memory game, this means that not only does a student have to learn a definition of a word or grammar concept but they have to remember it too.

If your student doesn’t revise then these things will escape the memory frighteningly quickly.

For this reason, I always build in a review section nearer the start of the lesson to check their knowledge of what we did in the previous lesson.

You can check pronunciation and definition of words or even a “Can you remember what we did in the last lesson?”.

As long as you are getting the students’ brains to reactivate some memories from what has been done before then they are more likely to remember these things in the long run.

Now we’ve covered everything that you need to create effective lesson plans.

Let’s look at an example lesson plan about IELTS Speaking Practise to give you an impression of how (simple) a lesson plan can look like!

There we have it, everything you need to start building your very own lesson plans from scratch.

Remember to experiment with the different parts you need for a lesson plan.

Once you have something that works, use that as a template for future lesson plans to make your life even easier!

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3 thoughts on “how to make a lesson plan for teaching english (the definitive guide)”.

Thank you so much ?, I really needed some guidance! Thank you for sharing ?

Thank you so much Jonathan for this wonderful piece. I have been inspired to effectively prepare my lessons. Good job!

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ESL Worksheets for Teachers

Check out our selection of worksheets filed under function: giving a presentation. use the search filters on the left to refine your search..

FILTER LESSONS

Customised lessons

Worksheet type

Upper-intermediate (B2-C1)

Students work with the theme of description in IELTS Listening Section 2 and Speaking Part 2. They define academic vocabulary related to describing courses of study and listen to an informative talk about a coding boot camp. After exploring useful expressions from the listening, they consider how to prepare for and practise delivering a Speaking Part 2 description of a course of study. There is also an optional extension activity with Speaking Part 3 questions that relate to the same topic.

This lesson is part of one unit in the IELTS preparation course plan which provides practice in listening/speaking, reading and writing for the IELTS exam. The full lesson plan takes a minimum of 60 minutes.

by Stephanie Hirschman.

This video-based lesson uses the topic of eyeglass design to introduce a range of academic vocabulary relating to description, one of the major themes of the IELTS exam. 

This lesson is the first part of Unit 1 in the Linguahouse IELTS preparation course plan, which provides exam practice in listening/speaking, reading and writing. The full lesson plan takes a minimum of 60 minutes.

by Stephanie Hirschman

Linguahouse.com is in no way affiliated with, authorized, maintained, sponsored or endorsed by TED Conferences LLC.

This video-based lesson uses the topic of alternative ways to power vehicles to introduce a range of academic vocabulary and structures relating to comparison, one of the major themes of the IELTS exam. This lesson is the first part of Unit 2 in the IELTS preparation course plan, which provides exam practice in listening/speaking, reading and writing. The full lesson plan takes a minimum of 60 minutes.

Advanced (C1-C2)

In this video-based lesson, students explore the origins of both well-known and unusual superstitions from around the world, while developing vocabulary and practising listening skills. Students examine discourse markers and activate these in one of two final activities: mini-presentations or a discussion. There is also an optional extension activity related to language for making predictions about the future. This lesson supports students who are preparing for IELTS and Cambridge exams.

By Stephanie Hirschman

Intermediate (B1-B2)

Students briefly discuss their own experiences of presentations before identifying types of diagrams often used in presentations and their functions. They listen to a business presentation and identify and practise a range of functional language for structuring presentations. The lesson includes vocabulary development and a presentation activity which can be extended to include preparation of slides with visual aids. Students should prepare and practise their presentation as homework and deliver it in another lesson. The materials also include an optional extension activity relating to what can go wrong with a presentation.

 This breaking news lesson covers New Zealand's declaration of victory over COVID-19. Students watch a short video of the press conference and develop their listening comprehension, speaking and intonation skills as they discuss the country's handling of the virus and the effects on the economy.

Students watch a video presentation of the history and significance of the innovative London Underground map. The worksheet focuses on discussion and vocabulary work, as well as delivering a presentation in English.

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Conversation Class Lesson Plan: A Step-by-Step Guide for Lively English Classes

Conversation is one of the most important ESL skills you can equip your students with.

In fact, it’s the ESL tool that will take your students’ noses out of textbooks and notebooks, letting them build English language confidence in a more natural way.

Let your students take on the “Chatty Cathy” persona with this outline for a wonderful ESL Conversation lesson plan.

I’ll show you a lesson structure that you can apply to any ESL conversation class, with specific examples and fun activities that your students will enjoy. 

What You Need for an Amazing ESL Conversation Lesson

How to structure esl conversation lesson plans, your guide to making esl conversation lesson plans, 1. esl conversation lesson warm-ups, 2. esl conversation presentation activity, 3. esl conversation practice activity, 4. esl conversation production activity.

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

First things first, get to know your students. It’s important to understand who they are, what they’re interested in and what they want to accomplish by learning English.

ESL students all have their unique reasons for learning English. They might want to get more work opportunities, travel around the world after retirement or even get into a master’s program abroad. 

When preparing your ESL conversation lesson plan, make sure the topic of the conversation is relevant to your student . A young adult will most likely want to discuss their favorite sports team or travel, not the latest business trends or political news. 

Another concept to consider is what ESL sub-skills will come up . You may find a few relevant idioms or phrasal verbs that you can add in as you go. You’ll also be observing how your student delivers their thoughts while keeping track of their pronunciation and grammar.

Checklist for ESL Conversation Lessons:

• Is the discussion relevant to my student’s interests and goals?
• Is the discussion moving along or is it beginning to stall?
• Are my student’s pronunciation and enunciation correct and clear?
• Is my student fumbling with vocabulary?
• Is my student using correct grammar?
• Is my student staying on topic and answering my questions correctly?

Without a good structure, your ESL conversation can stall and deteriorate quickly. To structure your lesson well, you can use the Presentation, Practice and Production (PPP) method:

• Presentation is the stage in the lesson where you show new material to your students in an exciting and informative way. This lays the foundation for the rest of the lesson.
• Practice is when you let your students practice the new material with guidance. This can involve collaborative exercises in pairs, in small groups or as a class.
• The Production stage is when you’ll take a step back and let students speak. You’ll float around and keep a close eye or ear, maybe answer a few questions here or there. This is satisfying because you’ll get to see your hard work take form in your students’ abilities.

You can start with a warm-up before moving on to these stages, then wrap up with a Q&A and feedback sharing from students. 

Let’s look more closely at how to implement the PPP structure in your ESL conversation class:

Before you dive into the meat of the lesson, make sure to do warm-ups first . Students spend the majority of their days speaking in their native language, so it takes a little time to get the English juices flowing . 

Make warm-ups as simple as possible—they’re meant to be easy and fun with little brainpower expended! Here are a few great ESL conversation warm-up activities:

The presentation stage is where your lesson really begins.

Visual aids are the best form of mental stimulation for most students. Putting together a presentation based on a few pictures is excellent and will be our example here.

Your presentation should follow the theme you’ll use for the lesson. Our theme for this sample ESL conversation lesson plan will be “National Parks.”

Animals are perfect for opening topics and then you can move into well-known geographical features or get deeper into the relationship between animals from each visual aid. There are a lot of national parks in the United States, so it’s best to choose only one to quell any confusion. 

Example Presentation Outline: 

• Visual #1:   A bear relaxing in Yellowstone . You’ll discuss what types of bears are in Yellowstone, what they eat and the importance of the bear to the ecosystem.
• Visual #2: A wolf in Yellowstone . You’ll discuss what wolves eat, how they group together and why they’re important to the ecosystem.
• Visual #3 : A wolf and a bear together. You can discuss the struggle between two of the top predators in Yellowstone and how they interact.

The presentation outline above is visually stimulating while encouraging your students to think and ask questions about what they’re seeing.

You can even show English videos to your students during the presentation. For instance, FluentU’s library has hundreds of diverse English videos for all levels, like movie clips, inspiring talks and popular vlogs. These are all learner-friendly because they come with interactive subtitles and vocabulary lists. 

For this stage, prepare a worksheet with each photo and a short description of what you presented. One side of the worksheet would be information and the other side would have a few questions that your students will use. 

After fielding a few questions about your presentation, you can pair your students up.  Remember, the practice stage of the PPP format is the collaboration stage. That means you’ll want to step back a little from your teaching power stance to let students have thoughtful discussions.

Sample Worksheet Questions: 

1. What do bears eat and how do they interact with each other as a bear population? What’s the bears’ relationship with the wolves?

2. How do wolves travel around Yellowstone (individually or in packs) and what do they eat? What’s the wolves’ relationship with the bears?

3. Student A Script: How can you defend bears when they bully wolves and take their food? Why are bears eating other things beside fish? Shouldn’t bears be hibernating during the winter months?

4. Student B Script: How can you say bears are the bullies when wolves attack bears in packs? Why can’t wolves share their food with bears? Why do wolves get to be in charge during the winter?

These questions cover all the key discussion points from your starting presentation.

The debate about which animal is better lets your students form their own opinions while using supporting information from your presentation. The first two questions also promote collaboration before they realize they’ll be debating.

Of course, these scripts are just an example—you can follow this format of questions for any topic! 

The production stage is your students’ time to shine and show all that they’ve learned without any help from their teacher. Just remember to keep an eye out for students that are overly shy and possibly not fully engaging.

In ESL conversation lessons, your students will still work with their classmates for the production stage. Depending on the size of your class, split the class into two groups and have them develop a theatrical performance based on what they now know about bears and wolves at Yellowstone.

A great way to structure the play is to  assign characters to students. Student A will be a park ranger, Student B a Yellowstone hiker or maybe journalist. Make sure some students also roleplay as (talking) bears and wolves so they can join the debate.

This production exercise is fun, and each student can construct statements freely, which builds their confidence.

With the versatile structure above, you can whip up all sorts of ESL conversation lesson plans and progressively train your students’ English skills. Try it out and watch your students blossom into free-speaking English language enthusiasts!

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