Topic: Whistle-blowing (Advanced ESL Lesson Plan)

ESL/EFL Level: Advanced (C1/C2)
Lesson Topic: whistleblowing, tobacco, business ethics
Skill Focus
: Speaking, Reading, Vocabulary
Approximate Class Time: 1.75 hours
Lesson Plan Download: whistleblowing-wigand-tobacco-advanced-032023.docx
Lesson Overview:

  • The reading passage tells the riveting story of Jeffrey Wigand, the whistleblower who exposed the tobacco industry in the 1990s, resulting in a major victory for public health. The passage (closer to C1 than B2) is full of idiomatic language and phrasal verbs.
  • Post-reading activities include a focus on idioms from the article d(including a few exercises), a debate about adopting a whistleblowing policy at a fictional company, a list of factors to consider before whistleblowing, and finally a list of unethical workplace scenarios for discussion.
  • All lessons come with warm-up questions, comprehension questions, a vocabulary section, and discussion questions.

Blow the whistle!

ADVANCED (C1/C2) Lesson on Whistleblowing

Warm-up Questions (Pair Work)

  1. What was the worst thing you did as a child? Did you get caught?
  2. What does it mean if someone is a rat in your language?
  3. Have you ever taken a complaint to your boss or the police?
  4. What does it mean to blow the whistle?

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-- Lesson plan on whistleblowing written 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. For questions, contact the author.

Note that a rat in American English is someone who tells an authority (e.g. a teacher, a parent, the police) about bad things you have done.

Follow-up question answers

  1. His boss didn’t want the public to know that cigarettes contain dangerous chemicals or ingredients, so he stopped the project.
  2. (There’s no indication that he was talking to the media at the time he was fired.)
  3. He claims he received a telephone call. The speaker threatened to harm his children.
  4. A smear campaign is an attempt to dirty (sully) someone’s reputation by spreading rumors about him/her. The passage claims that his former employer launched one against him for revealing disturbing facts about their products.
  5. The tobacco industry was forced to pay a large sum to the U.S. health care system.

Vocabulary answers: 1-a, 2-k, 3-j, 4-e, 5-d, 6-b, 7-f, 8-h, 9-i, 10-c, 11-g

Endnotes:

8 comments on “Topic: Whistle-blowing (Advanced ESL Lesson Plan)

  1. Yeyen Sladden (Posted on 8-8-2011 at 06:28) Reply

    Very good topic. My students likes it very much. Thank you for the idea.

  2. admin (Posted on 8-11-2011 at 02:00) Reply

    Thanks, Yeyen. Where are you teaching? I am teaching an advanced class here in Prague so that’s the main reason I’m making these advanced lessons. I try to make the vocabulary as challenging as possible for them. It’s good to hear that someone else is using the lessons =)

  3. Yahocaun (Posted on 4-5-2012 at 03:03) Reply

    Hello! My name is Frank. I’m engineer.

  4. Teacher Pete (Posted on 6-13-2012 at 23:33) Reply

    Brilliant. I love lessons with a role play, debate or some type of speaking activity at the end. The students seem to love it too!

  5. admin (Posted on 6-13-2012 at 23:47) Reply

    Great Pete. Thanks for the support.

  6. RACHELLE (Posted on 10-4-2013 at 12:08) Reply

    very good, thank you. I’ll be using today in a private 1-1.

  7. Hanna (Posted on 7-21-2014 at 12:18) Reply

    Great topic! My students loved it! Thanks!

  8. sandra Egloff (Posted on 3-5-2017 at 16:02) Reply

    Brillinat topic, goes with a lesson I am doing on ethics. Thank you

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