Don’t let these words confuse you!

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Vocabulary - commonly confused words

commonly confused words

LESSON OVERVIEW

The main objectives of this lesson are to:

  • learn and practise commonly confused words in various scenarios;
  • listen to and discuss a conversation between two people;
  • share personal opinions and experiences.

Students build vocabulary through suffixes, prepositions and homophones. They explore differences in meaning and use, apply words in different contexts and share their thoughts. Students also listen to a conversation between two friends, read a story about life in a new country and play two truths and one lie.

B1 / Intermediate
B2 / Upper Intermediate
60 minStandard LessonUnlimited Plan

SUFFIXES -IC/-ICAL

Students explore commonly confused words with different meanings (e.g. historic and historical). They choose the correct ones to complete gaps in pairs of sentences. Students then work in pairs and practise the words. They take turns describing items from a list (e.g. a historic event in your country) without naming them, while the other guesses what they are talking about

VERBS

In this activity, students read a story about adapting to a new country and choose the correct words (e.g. immigrate/migrant/emigrate) to complete it. They then choose the correct words in questions about different topics. Next, students respond using the word they didn’t choose.

HOMOPHONES

Students listen to a conversation between two people. They decide if statements are true or false and correct the false ones. Students listen again and complete gaps with words they hear. They then use the correct form of the commonly confused words to complete opinions on different topics. Students share their thoughts on the statements.

PREPOSITIONS

Students match pairs of sentences containing different prepositions (e.g. between, among) with the correct pictures. They then describe a photo of a busy city street using the words from the previous task. Students add details about themselves or their experience.

MISCELLANEOUS

In this task, students complete commonly confused words (e.g. dessert and desert) in pairs of dialogues with the correct letters. They then use the words they created to write statements about themselves: two truths and one lie. Their partner listens to their statements and guesses the lie. Students take turns until they have used all the words.

WORKSHEETS

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  1. MarkM

    shouldn’t the second word be MIGRATE?

    When Marta decided to immigrate/migrant/emigrate from her home country
    to the UK, she knew it wouldn’t be easy. She would have to

    1. Lignum Nyelviskola

      🧠 Easy way to remember:

      Immigrate = In

      Emigrate = Exit

      1. Kinga

        Lignum, That’s a great way to remember it! I’m sure many teachers and students will find it really helpful – thanks for sharing!

        MarkM, “Migrant” is a conscious choice here, as using “migrate” would work in both cases and create a double key. Besides, the aim of the task is to practise the difference between immigrate and emigrate, so it’s helpful to focus on those specifically.

  2. Lignum Nyelviskola

    It seems like an easygoing lesson, but it still practices essential words that are important in life. I really like it, thank you!

  3. Ju Cislaghi

    There’s a mistake on slide 33.. It says “make with a fresh tomatoes”.
    Also, shouldn’t economic and economical be switched on the first exercise?

    1. Justa

      Hi! Thanks for letting us know, we’ve just fixed that! Re economic and economical, the answers are correct the way they are presented in the teacher’s version.

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