Hi (Updated to reflect that Thunberg now has almost 15 million followers and I changed Prince Charles’ name to King Charles III) I have made a biography of Greta Thunberg taken from different sources. It’s been edited and reworded, along with my own information added It is designed primarly for non-native speakers but please don’t be put off it could be easily used for native speakers! You’ll just need to remove the vocab exercises. For this there are basically two versions (one is slightly easier). To begin with there are sentences introducing the new vocabulary, then students need to match up the definition with the new words along with a translation in their L1, then you can start the dictogloss. Then there is the comprehension that the dictogloss is based on along with comprehension questions. Finally there is a gap fill exercise from the “How Dare You?” speech (the video link is provided).

In my middle school class the chapter of the textbook was music so I thought I would do some activities related to songs / artists. There are some short comprehensions on videos on young musicians: Christian Li (violinist from Australia), Anke Chen (pianist from China), Lydian Nadhaswaram (pianist from India). In a separate resource I added a Mozart comprehension (obviously on the theme of young musicians!) so I will add it here too for ease. For this exercise the students have a ‘running dictation’ to do. Then there is a comprehension text on the wonderful story of Nandi Bushell and her drum-off with Dave Grohl. Finally, as Nirvana are mentioned in the Nandi Bushell text I created a gap fill for a parody song (for some humour in class) for Weird Al Yankovic’s “Smells Like Nirvana”. My teenage students liked it! They also asked to hear the original so I have added this link. All of the links for the songs are supplied in a separate Microsoft Word document for you.

Here is a comprehension text on the life of Mozart. It can be used for native speakers but has also been designed for learners of English (B1-B2). It will be fine for B1 given that the vocab activity will help them with some of the more advanced vocab. Firstly there is a running dictation that can be done in lesson one then students can read the definitions and translate. In Lesson 2 they can read the text on Mozart’s life and answer the True or False exercise and then rewrite the false sentences. The answers for the exercises are given at the end.

Here is a collection of lessons on WW2. Please note, it’s been recently modified. I decided to scrap some of the Powerpoints so most of it is in the booklet. But I have kept the old powerpoints just in case you prefer them. Lesson order: 1 Introduction to WW2 (Powerpoint) 2 Origins of WW2 (How Britain Hoped to Avoid War with Germany in the 1930s) (Word document) 3 Rationing (Powerpoint) 4 The Battle of Britain & The Blitz (Word document) 5 Operation Barbarossa (Word document) I used to have the Hitler biography here at the start of WW2 but decided to put it at the end of WW1 after the Great Depression. There is a separate booklet for questions. My students are French and we have a special history class, so the question booklet has translations of advanced words.

Here you have the biography of Adolf Hitler. UPDATE: I decided to make this longer and part of my WW1 lessons, just after the Great Depression, so it would be better to download that one. It’s longer but better I think. https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-12611367

[This has been updated 17.02.2023] In this pack there are Two Powerpoint lessons on weapons: 1st lesson: guns (pistols, rifles, machine guns), planes, zeppelins 2nd lesson: gas and tanks A Powerpoint Lesson on the Treaty of Versailles A workbook with questions from the weapons lessons the Treaty of Versailles and a separate booklet for the texts: The Battle of the Somme Sidney Lewis, Britain’s youngest soldier in WWI The end of WWI Origins of WWII video

This is a workbook with lessons on the origins of Australia

Momčilo Gavrić - The youngest soldier in WWI from Serbia at the age of 8. Please note - the preview shows the file in a weird format. The real file isn’t like this! This is basically a biography of Momčilo Gavrić. It’s been taken from different sources, edited and I’ve created some comprehension questions and added some pictures. His story is very interesting! (Edited on 20.10.2021)

Lesson 5 Uluru Lesson 6 Aborigines Lesson 7 Australia Day (updated for 2023) Lesson 8 Australia Cultural class This is the second part of my Australia scheme of work, but naturally you could use any of these lessons separately. There are two booklets. In the easier one there are two different exercises (just made a bit easier for weaker students). I have added the video clips to a Youtube list but some can’t be added The Uluru video on the PowerPoint is from the BBC and for some reason videos designed for children on Youtube cannot be saved to a playlist. But they are embedded in the PowerPoint lessons. Regarding the biographies: Hugh Jackman, Margot Robbie and Chris Hemsworth I get the students to, in groups of 3 or 4 take the text and try to summarise it then they read in front of the students who take notes (a kind of dictogloss) to see what they understand. After all this then students can read the biographies together in class. The biographies for Jackman, Robbie and Hemsworth have been taken from different sources edited, rewritten and like all my other lessons I’ve added pics and formatted it myself.

This is a collection of lessons starting with a general lesson on animals unique to Australia, then moving on to kangaroos, koalas, the tasmanian devil, snakes and spiders.

Hello all When the Taliban sadly took over Afghanistan in 2021 I knew that some of my original lessons would be no longer relevant and out-of-date. But with it all being recent I decided to wait to update it. Finally it’s been done and the lessons have been revamped - booklet 3 in particular. I have added more information about the Taliban, such as a profile of the current leader, the education clampdown, an updated TED talk with Shabana Basij-Rasikh (Dec 2021) amongst other things. For the TED talk it’s a bit long so I would only show from about 5 minutes to 10 minutes. The original documents took me a long time to prepare and it’s taken several hours to update, so I hope you appreciate the effort. I’ve tried to make it as up-to-date as possible Just to note, sometimes there are key words translated into French as I teach in a French school (student level is B2/B2+)

This is a set of lessons on Australia. I used to have the Commonwealth as the first lesson in my Australia scheme of work but have decided to not use it, so I’ll just add it as an extra. Lesson 1 – Penal Colony Lesson 2- The origins of Australia Lesson 3 - Tourism in Australia. I made this on Prezi but have made a new PowerPoint that has replaced the Prezi. Lesson 4 - Focus on Sydney (updated 11.2023) Although I call them Lessons 1, 2, 3 and 4 they will take more than one lesson depending on how long a lesson lasts in your school. I made class tests for each lesson but deleted them just in case my students found them! The workbook has a harder and easier version but the only difference is for the Sydney video as the video gap fill is a bit easier. The videos are embedded in the lessons, but if they don’t work you could copy the link and go to the site manually.

I created this for a literature class on the Boy in the striped pyjamas. There are vocabulary exercises to pre-teach difficult vocabulary from the book and questions to check understanding. For a few parts I’ve included a text with some historical context. If your students are native speakers I guess you could just delete the vocabulary parts. Mine are French.

Hello all, This pack consists of a set of lessons on WW1 This has taken me many hours to create, so I hope you appreciate it! There are some vocabulary lists as my students are non-native speakers but are in an international school so have a high level If your students are native speakers this part could be simply removed. Start of WWI Propaganda Britain’s underage soldiers Trenches WWI Letters, the ‘white feather’ campaign and a poem by Siegried Sassoon. The Christmas Truce of 1914

The OJ Simpson murder case: Dictogloss and Comprehension text This is a text I created based on different sources and my own editing. If you don’t know what a dictogloss is, full instructions are included in the document.

This short story is available for free on The New Yorker’s website, but I have edited it slightly. Plus, I have created vocabulary exercises, preteaching vocabulary that appears in the text along with comprehension questions to check understanding of the text. I have also written my own biography of Haruki Murakami adding some information about “magic realism” given that this short story employs some magical realism techniques. There is also a short article on the difference between jealousy and envy (if you read the story you will understand why). This is a high level B2 or low C1 level on the CEFR scale. I found it great for students studying FCE or CAE level given that it has lots of advanced adjectives and great phrasal verbs needed at these 2 levels.

Hi I created this for a pretty low level class of young learners. It’s a biography of David Beckham. I recently improved it and added some French words but you could remove this part or change the words to your students’ L1. The questions are purposely designed to be quite simple and the ‘extra’ part is for stronger students.

I have created this workbook as a guide and background to Anne Frank’s diary. It has been recently updated and I used a newer video comprehension. I have also created a question booklet, which has vocabulary exercises and a good video comprehension, but I haven’t finished all of the questions for the diary. However, I have uploaded it because it has the video comprehension. My plan is to finish it later but it’s literally hours of work so the question booklet stops at Saturday, 30 January 1943.

The Weeknd - Save your Tears (featuring Ariana Grande) The Weeknd - Blinding Lights With this activity it’s not just a simple gap fill. The intention is rather to get the students to focus on some of the grammar points that they’ve studied this school year (well at least my students have!) I have attached the Youtube links in the Word document. The first part is a gap fill then students need to analyse the text to find particular tenses or rhymes, then finally create their own verse of either song. Of course you could modify any of the grammar based on what your students do or don’t know.

I got the idea for this when I found some excerpts of the diary online which looked to be scanned from a class book, but I didn’t like the questions so I made my own. I have started with a very simple background on what Yugoslavia was with questions, then excerpts from the book along with comprehension questions every so often to check understanding of the text and then a conclusion on her life with comprehension questions. There are also some vocabulary activities to pre-teach difficult words, so if your students are native English speakers I guess you could simply edit and delete these sections.