Underpopulation or overpopulation?

Paula | Oct 30, 2023Oct 30, 2023

LESSON OVERVIEW

With this C2 worksheet, students learn and practise some advanced vocabulary, discuss over- and underpopulation and watch an informative video. 

WARM-UP & VIDEO

In a warm-up task of this C2 worksheet, students look at four photos showing crowded and empty places. They need to discuss questions related to them. Then, they look at some concepts (e.g. exponential growth, extreme poverty) and share their understanding of them. They also say how they think the concepts might be related to overpopulation or underpopulation. The teacher can ask students to research the concepts online. Students watch the video for the first time to check their answers. After that, students look at a list of factors and decide which were mentioned in the video. They watch it again to check their answers. 

DISCUSSION

In this part of the C2 worksheet, students discuss how some other factors affect the issues of overpopulation and underpopulation. Next, they look at some questions and think of synonyms for words in bold (e.g. threshold, defuse, overlap). Finally, they watch the video one more time and answer the questions. Afterwards, they discuss some issues related to the content of the video. For instance, they talk about the ethical concerns that should be considered when discussing under- and overpopulation. They also look at some quotes and statistics and complete a statement about under- and overpopulation with their own ideas. 

You can also encourage students to discuss the extent to which they agree with the quotes, share the concerns and how the statements are related to the video or the reality around them.

HOMEWORK/REVISION

This C2 worksheet includes an additional task that teachers can use as homework or revision. In the task, students practise the vocabulary from the lesson. The task is available in the teacher’s version of the worksheet. You can print it and hand it out to your students. It’s also included in the e-lesson plan.

WORKSHEETS

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