B1 – Are you a Bookworm?

Are you a Bookworm? is my second lesson of the Preply course titled Culture Vulture. As the title suggests, the class shifts its focus from music to books. Even though the lesson is on reading habits, the primary purpose of this class is speaking.

As I’ve mentioned before, I gave much more thought to this group class and completed it with one group so far. I wanted to keep students on their toes and change the topic, as well as the structure of the class, so they wouldn’t get bored too quickly. Since the first lesson The Power of Music was mainly focused on listening, I thought that the second lesson should be centred around speaking. The second reason was that unfortunately fewer people are genuinely interested in books, so to keep them engaged, I wanted them to speak for almost the whole lesson.

If you are interested in this class, you can download the lesson plan and the presentation at the end of the post.

I wanted to start the class by bringing to attention the fact that reading is one of the most essential skills in our lives. Students begin their speaking by thinking about situations when they read without realising. Ask them to think of a few things we read which aren’t books. My examples included newspapers, notes, recipes, shopping lists, etc. Discuss the importance of understanding the text in that context.

Proceed by talking about students’ speaking habits. This can be done in pairs or small groups. Students interview each other and think if they prefer to read paper versions, e-books, or maybe listen to audiobooks. If some of your students are into audiobooks, you can start a debate about whether listening to books could be counted as reading. End this part of the lesson by thinking of two advantages and disadvantages of reading printed material as opposed to digital. In my lesson, students immediately came up with examples, such as the full reading experience by holding and smelling the book, which was the most important to all of them.

I’m a big fan of PET and FCE speaking part 3 question type and love including similar tasks in my speaking-oriented lessons. Start this part by discussing the saying Don’t judge a book by its cover. For sure the students have heard this expression before and will be able to explain it in their own words. With a show of hands, you can check who agrees or disagrees with this statement.

Divide students into pairs or small groups and ask them to decide the main criterium for choosing a book to read. Is it the author, the title, the cover, the genre or maybe good reviews? Give each group two to three minutes to choose the main point. Elicit answers from each group and ask them to justify their choices. Finish this part by focusing on book reviews, as it is the main focus of the next part. Ask if students read or write book reviews once they finish reading.

For this part of the class, I searched for short and real book reviews. I found two that seemed to be just perfect. They were written by Brief Book Reviews (Brief Book Reviews on Instagram) in a post titled Going on vacation? If you are a bookworm and are looking for some great book suggestions, I recommend checking that blog. Students read two book reviews, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North and A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towels, and decide which of the two books they would prefer to read and why. Students discuss how a good book review can change their opinion on books.

Finally, students compare their reading habits in the past and the present. Ask them to think about their favourite childhood books and the reasons why they enjoyed them. Students work individually and think about their top 3 all-time favourite books. Go over a classroom and check the answers. Ask to justify their top picks.

Students hold on to their top 3 lists, as they will need them in the next part of the lesson. Explain the roleplay to the students. Student A describes their current reading needs and asks Student B for help choosing their next read. Based on that description, Student B chooses one of his top 3 books and recommends it to their partner. Students try to convince each other to read one of their favourite books.

If you have some time left, you can finish the class with a general group discussion on books and their reading habits. As always, end the class with speaking feedback and error correction.

So how many of your students are bookworms? Get your files below and find out!