The aim of this lesson is talking and writing about the dos and don’ts of office Christmas parties. It is a great opportunity to revise and practice different ways of giving advice. The lesson is suitable for adult students, levels pre-intermediate and above. The lesson is based on the article published in The Telegraph.
The Task
To teach the class, you will need this emaze presentation
Slides 1-2: Introduction
Find out whether your students attend their office Christmas parties and what these events are about.
Slides 3-5: Brainstorming
Discuss the quote from the article with our students: Office Christmas party is a minefield of potential embarrassing missteps
Ask your students to brainstorm 5 mistakes people make at office Christmas parties. Then compare with the chart and find out whether your students have ever witnessed mentioned situations.
Slides 6-10: Paragraph titles and vocabulary
Students try to title 6 paragraphs from the article using pictures as clues. Then they match different words with appropriate paragraphs.
Slides 11-12: Reading and writing
Students read one paragraph from the article and identify different pieces of advice it contains and various ways in which the advice is given (imperative, It’s best to…). Ask the students to come up with more ways of giving advice:
- you should / shouldn’t…
- you’d better…
- your best choice is to…
- consider …-ing
- try …-ing
- it is a good idea to…
- make sure to…on
Students work individually or in pairs, choose the paragraph title and write a short text giving advice to someone getting ready to attend their office Christmas party. Encourage your students to use the vocabulary from the article and vary ways in which they give advice. Finally, compare different texts and make a list of best office Christmas party suggestions.
Looking for more Christmas classes ideas? See video-based Christmas activities and a conversation class about Christmas gifts.
Personal Experience
Coming up with Christmas topics for adult students might be pretty challenging but I have noticed they are very appreciative of festive lessons and often get in the spirit more than younger learners. This class is an extended version of a speaking class I taught last year with upper intermediate students. We started talking about office Christmas parties after I showed my group these two short video clips from TV shows: Mad Men and The Office.
The conversation revolved mostly around embarrassing party mistakes people make and trying to live them down after Christmas. My students seemed to have liked the class a lot and I kept this in mind. This year I was really lucky to find a fitting article that goes with this topic so I am really looking forward to teaching this class, both face to face and online.
I absolutely love this lesson! Is there any chance you could provide the presentation in PPT because not everyone has access to the Internet during their classes and free emaze account does not allow for any download.
Thanks for your comment! I am afraid this presentation is only available in the online mode for now.