Coffee: The Greatest Addiction Ever

Coffee: The Greatest Addiction Ever

Now, creativity can come from anywhere, but sometimes a busy online teacher needs a little bit of assistance. I started using the Woodpecker app a few weeks ago, and the main advantage for me is, that it is a wonderful source of inspiration for lesson ideas. I have a number of long-term conversation students, which means I constantly need new lesson materials. I often use TED as a source for creating lessons based on videos. However, variety is the spice of life (so is coffee, apparently). I came across a YouTube channel called C.G.P. Grey on Woodpecker. According to its description, it contains a variety of explanatory videos with animations on topics about politics, geography, economics, and British culture. I chose a video from the channel and have used the functions in the Woodpecker app to create a mixed level conversation lesson about 'Coffee'. 

      

Despite the fact that the video is about a potentially excellent topic for conversation, I wouldn't have usually chosen it for a lesson, as the speaker speaks very fast. There are web applications like Otranscribe that allow you to slow down the speed of the video.  Nik Peachey wrote a post about using this app to improve 'Bottom-up' listening skills. However, with the Woodpecker app, students can cope with the fast narration by using a variety of functions like reading along with a transcript or going back one sentence to re-listen to chunks of the video. Students, who have the app on their phone, are able to work at their own pace, using the specific functions that they need, to help them to understand the video. Additional information about the app's functions can be seen in my last two blog posts, 10 Phrasal Verbs for the Office and What Countries Have Tried Universal Basic Income?

Lesson objectives

The objective of the lesson is to improve speaking skills and fluency, expand vocabulary and develop both micro and macro listening skills. In addition, Task 2 reviews the language of preference.

The lesson consists of a warm-up exercise, eight tasks, homework activities and an answer key.

Warm up: Encourage students to talk about the topic of coffee, their habits, their opinions, and check their coffee knowledge.

Task 1: Types of coffee. Match the name of the coffee types with the diagram. This is just for fun and could be useful to help students order their favourite type of coffee when abroad.  This exercise should be completed quite quickly.

Task 2: Expressing preference.  Review the different ways of talking about preference and encourage students to use the different structures to talk about their coffee preferences.

Task 3: Coffee facts. Get students to predict the answers to the questions before watching the first 0:38 seconds of the video. Encourage students to watch the video using the Woodpecker app (horizontal mode) or Youtube (CC off) WITHOUT subtitles and answer the questions.  

Task 4: Fill the gaps. Students watch the first 0:38 seconds of the video again and should focus on listening for specific details, numbers and names of countries. Then they should fill the gaps in the transcript. If necessary they can repeat the video and use the Woodpecker text and go-back functions (Portrait mode) or YouTube subtitles (CC on) to help complete the exercise.

Task 5: How is coffee made? Students should look at the table and predict the names of the stages of coffee from pollination to espresso using the photos. Then, watch the video without subtitles and note the names of the stages. If necessary they can repeat the video and use the Woodpecker text and go-back functions (portrait mode) or YouTube subtitles (CC on) to help complete the exercise.

Task 6: Comprehension. Get students to quickly predict the answers to the questions and then watch the last part of the video without subtitles. If necessary they can repeat the video and use the Woodpecker text and go-back functions (subtitles in YouTube) to help complete the exercise.

Task 7: Discussion. Encourage students to speak, share their opinions, talk about their preferences and generally use the language from the lesson.

Task 8: A coffee phrase. Ask students to guess the meaning of the expression, if they are not familiar with it.  They can also google the expression and compare the different definitions.

Homework: The first 6 short tasks require the use of the Woodpecker app and the objective is to review the language from the lesson and to improve listening and comprehension skills using the C.G.P.Grey video. The additional activity is a listening and writing exercise using a BBC Learning English Podcast about coffee addiction.

The lesson materials

Click to view the lesson materials in Google Docs

Click to view the video in the Woodpecker app

Click to view the video on YouTube

Conclusion

Once again, the Woodpecker app has helped me to find a new source of inspiration for lesson creation. It has also opened my eyes to the possibility of using a wider variety of videos in my lessons. For my students, I believe, it will give them the confidence to listen to and cope with videos that otherwise would be impossible for them to understand.

I would also like to mention that I have used the amazing Eltpics on Flickr to add photographs to this lesson.  Eltpics is a collection of photographs collected by teachers for teachers.  For more information and teaching ideas you can visit their website. I have also used an image from freedigitalphotos.net. And Latteartguide very kindly gave me permission to use their 'Coffee types' diagram.

Please feel free to comment, I appreciate any feedback.  If you are a Google+ member please comment below. If you're on Facebook please message me there and of course, you can always contact me through my website: http://talk2meenglish.wixsite.com/lessons