Lesson Topics: emergencies, mortality, regrets
Skill Focus: Reading, Speaking, Vocabulary
Approximate Class Time: 2 hours
Lesson Plan Download: ten-minutes-to-live-intermediate-082025.docx
- The lesson begins with warm-up questions about accomplishment and near-death experiences.
- The intermediate lesson (this one) of this topic turned out the best. The reading passage begins with a summary of a false missile alert that occurred in Hawaii in 2018. This paragraph is followed by a description of some reactions among Hawaiians during the 38 minutes before learning the alert was a false alarm. The passage ends by describing how the terrifying experience prompted one Hawaiian to change her life around and start living more actively without regret.
- The reading passage is followed by comprehension and follow-up questions.
- Next, students match vocabulary from the passage to definitions. They then form discussion questions with the target vocabulary.
- In the first speaking activity, students discuss what they'd do if they had 10 minutes, one day, or one year to live.
- The highlights of this lesson are its roleplays, both of which are based on apparently true stories that occurred after the missile alert. In the first, a woman must explain a white lie she told to a friend who confessed that he loved her after hearing the alert. In the second, a woman attempts to sue the state of Hawaii for the alert which led her alcoholic brother into a relapse that ultimately cost him his life.
- As the lesson draws to a close, students review the lesson's vocabulary, discuss famous quotations, and then match collocations used in the video.
- The lesson closes with some final discussion questions.
INTERMEDIATE (B1/B2) Lesson about Thirty-Eight Minutes to Live
Warm-up
- What are some major things that you have achieved so far?
- What are some major things in life that you have not achieved yet?
- Have you ever thought your life was about to end? (Note: avoid telling any really sad stories)
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This lesson plan was created by Matthew Barton of EnglishCurrent.com (copyright). Site members may photocopy and edit the file for their classes. Permission is not given to rebrand the lesson, redistribute it on another platform, or sell it as part of commercial course curriculum. ChatGPT was used to generate answer keys and some famous quotations. For questions, contact the author.
Comprehension Question Answer Key
- …
- 38 minutes
- A worker clicked the wrong option during a test of the emergency system
- Examples: hid in basements, opened manholes, lay in bathtubs, ran to the coast, sent a message to his boss
- …
- She followed her own goals, wrote a book, travelled alone in Europe, and started a new career
- …
Vocabulary: 1-d, 2-i, 3-h, 4-f, 5-j, 6-b, 7-g, 8-e, 9-a, 10-c
Collocations: 1-b, 2-d, 3-a 4-c
[1] Passage sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Hawaii_false_missile_alert, https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jun/14/moment-changed-me-missile-alert-death, https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/7qel3h/ama_request_someone_who_made_an_impulse_decision/