Housing and apartments

This lesson is particularly useful with students studying abroad.

1. Students seated in a circle with the teacher. Write what do I like about my apartment/house or something along those lines. Share something about yourself and your house. Allow students to ask questions and do not stop any debate about the topic.

2. Count 1-20 around the circle and every third number stop. This person shares something they like about his/her apartment/house. Again, allow for questioning or debate. At this stage, do not be worried if there are not questions.

Any negatives that arise can be used in later stages of the lesson or can be used to make a roleplay instead of stage 4.

3. In groups, ask learners to make a list of the most and least important things for an apartment in the city you all live. Optional: ask groups to swap lists and agree/disagree on any points

Now there are two options 4a Ask learners to plan a phone call to a landlord to make an appointment to see an apartment. *I normally note down where language is missing and input snippets of language.

Include information from important and not important lists. Sit students back to back to role-play the phone call

After the first practice, give some feedback on the call. Encourage students to share what they found difficult

Share some good examples of language from the roleplay. Reformulate some language that needs to be improved with the class. Drill fixed expressions as chunks for natural sounding rhythm and stress, highlighting areas of connected speech and stressed syllables.

Change the pairings and repeat the roleplay you can repeat this as many times as you feel is necessary, adding new language or changing the conditions by adding restrictions such as you are in a hurry or you are very picky.

Ask learners to copy new language from the activity and any other emerging language from the lesson in their notebooks, with any notes on pronunciation. 4b Ask learners to write an email to a landlord enquiring about an apartment or room they have seen on a website In groups, swap emails and comment on the language used in the email. Move around the room and take some examples of good language and note areas where language is missing (especially for style and use of fixed expressions). With the whole of the class, construct a skeleton email, using contributions from students and elicited reformulations. Ask students to copy the email structure with new lexis which emerged from the activity in their notebooks. 5. Review new vocabulary from the lesson