| LESSON OVERVIEW
The main objectives of this lesson are to:
- discuss political systems and public affairs;
- practise vocabulary to discuss politics;
- listen to news segments on political topics.
In this lesson, students talk about political life, governance and public affairs. They explore vocabulary to discuss politics (e.g. mayor, political party, citizen), talk about political concepts and roles and share ideas about their country’s political system, laws and government. Students explore word stress patterns, share their views and work with headlines. They also listen to news pieces involving politics and play a guessing game in pairs.
B2 / Upper Intermediate45 min
60 minVocabulary LabPremium Plan
This is a Vocabulary Lab worksheet. With it, students are introduced to a set of vocabulary on a specific topic and practise it through controlled activities, speaking tasks and games. Learn more about it here.
WARM-UP AND VOCABULARY
This lesson starts with a warm-up. Students look at the photo of a parliament in session. They then discuss the pros and cons of being a politician and whether they’d like to have that job. Afterwards, students match vocabulary to discuss politics (e.g. president, mayor, citizen) with the definitions. Following that, they discuss politicians and government roles. Then, students read sentences and try to understand phrases (e.g. bill, political party, vote in elections). After that, they talk about political concepts and roles. Moving on, students discuss political systems and responsibilities in their country. Later on, they categorise words (e.g. candidate, citizen, minister) according to their word stress pattern (e.g. the first syllable is stressed). Subsequently, students look back at the sentences from the previous task, say if they apply to their country and give details.
DISCUSSION AND LISTENING PRACTICE
In this part of the lesson, students correct vocabulary and spelling mistakes in opinions on politics and elections (e.g. Votes should be counted twice before announcing who won the election). Afterwards, they engage in discussing politics by choosing statements from the previous exercise and saying whether they agree with them. Moving on, they look at article headlines (e.g. Government to pass new green bill) and say what details they might expect to read in the articles. Following that, students listen to a recording with two pieces of news. They choose the best headline from the previous task for each. Next, students listen to the recording again and do tasks where they choose the words they hear. Finally, they work in pairs. Students take turns describing the vocabulary to discuss politics (e.g. citizen, politician, bill) for two minutes while their partner guesses.
HOMEWORK/REVISION
This lesson also includes an additional task that you can use as homework or revision. In the task, students complete gaps to create words for discussing politics. They then choose five sentences and finish them with their ideas. 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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Dear Ewa,
thank you for a truly great lesson on Politics! We should have more lessons based on this area of interest 😀
Nevertheless we would like to draw your attention to question 3 on slide 15:
“Do citizens who are not politicians vote in elections or run for office?”
So the published answer is that they can only “vote in elections”. However! We believe that precedent shows that there have been many occasions where citizens who are NOT politicians have run for office. Take Nawrocki for example, he was a boxer I understand! (joking but he was just in charge of the museum in Gdańsk, that’s all).
and take the current occupant of the White House, 0 political background before running for the 2016 presidency.
Please can this answer be reviewed!?
Hi there! Thanks for the comment. You’re absolutely right and we’ve changed the answer.
Also! Question 5: “Do all people have the same rights in a democracy?”
The correct answer here should be
No!
Why so you may ask?
In a democracy, people have equal fundamental rights under the law, but not the same rights in practice.
Some rights depend on citizenship (e.g. voting).
Some depend on age (minors vs adults).
Some depend on legal status (residents, migrants, prisoners).
Some depend on context (public office, employment, contracts).
What democracy promises is equality before the law, not identical rights for everyone. Anyone claiming otherwise is confusing a moral ideal with legal reality.
Thanks! We’ve rephrased the question.