!!! Teachers: This lesson is inappropriate for most classes. I made it for two of my students. Teaching this to the wrong group will get you fired.
Download the Swearing in English lesson plan: How-to-Swear-in-English-Intermediate-23092012.doc
Lesson Plan Preview: Swearing in English
Swearing in English: Warm-up Questions
Swearing in English: What would you say in the following situations if you were angry?
Swearing in English: Replace the underlined expressions with a word from the below box.
what the fuck bitch suck fuck me fuck it fuck off |
1) A: Excuse me. Would you like to purchase a subscription to Celebrity Gossip Magazine? B: Go away! | 2) A: The clerk at the store was so rude. B: I know. She was such a girl with a bad attitude. |
3) A: David, you're fired. Please clean out your desk and go home. B: Oh no, my life is over. I just bought a house. | 4) A: What is happening? Why is there a car in my driveway? B: Weird. I don't know. |
5) A: Erin, do you want to dance? B: No, thanks. I am really bad at dancing. | 6) A: Mike, the dog has run away again! B: Who cares. The dog will come back if it wants to. |
Answers
1 = Fuck off! 2 = bitch 3 = Fuck me. 4 = What the fuck? 5 = suck 6 = Fuck it.
Swearing in English: Some Similar Expressions
* Bonus Question: Which of the above words mean penis?
Answers
dick, dickhead, prick
Swearing in English
| Darn it. | = |
| What the heck? | = |
| Oh my gosh. | = |
Answers
Damn it, What the [fuck/hell]?, Oh my god
Swearing in English: Language Focus
Swearing in English: Phrasal Verb Focus
To fuck up sth = to mess something up; to ruin sth (make sth good become bad) . “The new software fucked up my computer. / My ex-girlfriend fucked up my life.”
To fuck with sb = to mess/interfere with sb/sth; to play a trick/joke on someone. “A: Bob said he was gay, but he was just fucking with you. He's not really gay.” / “Don't fuck with me. I'm in a gang.”
Swearing in English Lesson Plan: Connect the below idea(s) to make a sentence.
uprising / government | |
screw / bitch | |
fucking / suck / English | |
| cunt / fuck off | |
| life / fuck / up | |
| fuck with / boss |
Answers
- The bitch told me to screw off.
- Peter fucking sucks at English.
- I told the old cunt to fuck off.
- My life is totally fucked up now.
- Don't fuck with the boss or you'll get fired.
Swearing in English lesson plan copyright Englishcurrent.com
This is the coolest lesson I’ve read so far. My students will definitely love this.
A very interesting lesson plan (for adult students I presume), however teachers must remember to consider the attitudes and opinions of your students before teaching such a sensitive topic (but that is just common sense). If you have the time and would like to know more about teaching profanity and swearing (and get some some research backed guidelines for teaching such topics) then please check out my lecture and article: http://www.joshesl.com/taboo–slang.html
Have a great day,
Josh
I’m glad to hear that. But be careful with it =)
Let me know if it doesn’t work out or you have any suggestions.
I’m planning to try it out today with one of my groups. Let’s hope they’re going to enjoy it.
Hehe. I hope you don’t lose your job =) Have fun with it!
Thanks for the great lesson! I can’t wait to use this with my hard-to-reach teens!
Hehe. Three people have now posted about how they are excited to try the lesson. But I haven’t heard from anyone _after_ they tried it. …. :\
Hopefully it has worked out for you guys!
I teach adults in company — they ask about the usage of foul language all the time, because they hear it in meetings, on television, on the radio, etc., — and I while I don’t spend an entire lesson on it, I don’t shy away from it, because it’s part of the English people speak every day. It’s a fair question for folks who I know will hear these words as a part of their job (even if only on the television).
I also do lessons on slang, idioms, and figures of speech…even advanced-level students can get derailed by something as seemingly simple as “a horse of a different color”.
I don’t know that I’ll use the entire lesson, but it’s a tool to have on hand when the questions inevitably come….
I’ve done swearing before in corporate lessons. They’re adults, so usually it’s okay. I don’t know about a mix of different ages of adults. I’m going to give this a try because it looks good, but I have from twenty to sixty five in this class. We’ll see.
Hmm. I’m not sure I’d teach it to 65-year olds =) But I guess it depends on the person. I hope it works out!
I suggested a similar lesson plan to a school I was teaching. The response? “Are you trying to shut the school down!”
Do you have an X-rated version of this plan? (!) (for my private adult class)
I probably agree with your former school, to be honest. This is not the type of material a ‘professional institution of education’ would like associated with its name =) Maybe it’s best for private students who you know quite well ;)
ps: there is no x-rated version (I don’t even know what an x-rated lesson plan would look like ;P)
This is brilliant. Can’t wait to try this out tomorrow. Thanks a lot!
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Hi. This is awesome. Though I offered my class a lesson on filler words and they actually asked me to do a lesson for swear words. Anyway I am affraid i cannot provide them with enough seapking ractice :)
Excellent. I actually have my first ever class on American cuss words because for a foreinger, Hearing some words can be easily mis-interpreted and or pronounce poorly. Part of becoming fluent in any language includes a few classes on profanity. Thanks much for posting this lesson plan.
My adult students asked for a cursing lesson and this plan will work brilliantly.
That’s quite funny and interesting , however if I showed this to my Teacher he would’ve killed me, but anyway… thanks))
I okayed a lesson on profanity with a group of upper-intermediate adults before using it this evening. The lesson was a lot of fun for everyone, and the students quickly got over the embarrassment of swearing in English. I supplemented the material with some general discussion questions on profanity and peppered it with a few Yiddish words common in American English.
I’m surprised there isn’t more available for teachers on the internet regarding profanity. Thanks for writing this lesson!
I love it. I thought I was the only one to have made a lesson plan on this subject. I teach in BKK and The Thai students love it. I remember when I was growing up, the first words I wanted to learn were the bad words. Then I could say fuck you in another language, to my teacher, and she wouldn’t know.In my current lesson plan I made a dialogue which the students act out…It is hilarious. Because Thai culture is very soft, they don’t yell much and so a lot of tension is kept inside. When I do these skits I really make them put feeling into it and it’s pretty interesting. Cussng is definitely a pressure release technique. Thai bad words are very tame.
What a good lesson plan you made and let me know if you want to collaborate. Thumbs up!!!
Thanks Doug. Regarding collaboration, do you write lesson plans as well? The site has had guest posters in the past. Send me an email (contact@englishcurrent.com) if you’d like to discuss it.
That’s totally awesome! Thankee
My students gonna like this
Thank you so much, it’s such a great help for me.
Regards
Carina
This is my favourite lesson by FAR.
I know at least 3 students who will LOVE it, and I can’t wait to show it to them.
Well planned– I’m excited to try it!
Well, since my students are swearing at each other in English anyway, I might as well teach them the meaning of the words they so enjoy spouting out without much thought.
My students literally BEGGED for a lesson on swearing in English, yours is awesome, they will love it! Thank you so much!
not my cup of tea
My senior students found the idea of such a lesson plan revolting. No Thanks!
very good!
This is gold. Thank you for planning this out so clearly! I’m teaching slang, colloquialisms and foul language to two ESL adult students. I think they will be thrilled with this part. I’ll let you know afterwards!
I am going to try parts of your lesson with my English class (German native speakers, all adults, of course). What’s more, I have a memory card game where you need to match pairs of words to find British English swearwords , so I will use that game as a warm-up exercise. However, one thing I am going to mostly leave out are profanities with a sexual connotation…
Thank you! It is a really cool lesson plan!
This is cracking me up. It’s so professionally done yet so vulgar at the same time. Well done! :)