Example Lesson Plan 1

Teacher: Kim Edmunds, Kaitlin Griswold, and Sabina Simon

Level: A5
Date: Week 2 (of a two-week unit)
Goal: Students will understand and learn how to use stress and intonation patterns correctly.
Objectives (SWBAT):
Students Will Be Able To
1. Understand stress and stress patterns and how to use them properly.
2. Understand importance of intonation and stress and creating/changing meaning.
3. Understand and use advanced vocabulary regarding emotions.
4. Describe people and situations without mentioning the actual people or situations; they will use
knowledge of the people and situations to construct a scene for their classmates.
Theme: Amazing Inventions
Aim/Skill/Microskill

Activity/Procedure/Stage

Interaction

Time

Warm-Up:
Review HW

T asks the Ss if there are questions about the

HW from the workbook. Remind the Ss about
the TED Talk video that was assigned for HW
as well.

WC

15-20
min

T-Ss

2 min

WC

10 min

Answer questions from the workbook HW (not

anticipating too many since the activities were
not too challenging). Discuss TED Talk. Write
questions the Ss were supposed to answer on
the board. Elicit answers from Ss. Limit the
discussion because it is not the focus of the
lesson
Remind the Ss that the answers to the HW will
be sent out the night before the class it is due
(if there are actual answers as opposed to
writing assignments). This may change
depending on the way in which you assign
HW. It saves time to have the students check
their answers on their own and come to class
with questions.
Linking & Transitioning to the rest of lesson:
Remember how we ended last class? What was
the activity? Now we are going to focus on
making stress and intonation patterns clearer.
Activity 1:
Discussion of the use of stress in
English

Pre-Stage:
1.1.1 T passes out handout about stress and
intonation. Tell the Ss that stress is the driving
force for conveying meaning in English.
During Stage:
2.1.1 Go over the handout. There are two
sections: one about using stress to convey

particular meaning, and one about stress

patterns in words themselves. After reviewing
the first section, T says the sentence No one
knows who invented the wheel, a few times,
stressing different words while stretching a
rubber band (stretching to indicate stressed
words).

Transition to #3: Now that we

have discussed stress and stress
patterns in more detail, lets take a
closer look at intonation patterns.

T gives Ss rubber bands as well. Follow the Ts WC

example of stretching a rubber band when
stressing words. Practice a few times with
different phrases. Teaching stress is very
difficult because it is very hard for the Ss to
replicate. Make sure to take as much time as
you need to ensure that the Ss have at least
some understanding of it and can
recognize/replicate it in some degree.

5-10
min

Discuss meaning given to phrases depending

WC
on the stress and intonation. T repeats the stress
pattern for the first phrase stresses different
words. Ss write down observations about
meaning. Have them go over their observations
with a partner. Discuss as a class. Make sure to
guide the Ss at this part but not to give them
the answers. Even if it takes them a little while
to come up with anything!

10 min

Go over the second part of the handout. Pass

T-Ss
out the answers to the pronunciation activity on
p. 61. Ss read through the dialogue in pairs,
emphasizing the stress on the underlined
portions of the words. Ask for 2 volunteers to
read the dialogue to the class.

2 min

Post-Stage:
3.1.1 Remind the Ss that stress can be applied
to whole words as well as to syllables within
words. Stressed words generally are the focus
of sentences but that does not mean that other
words/syllables do not receive stress

T-Ss

2 min

Tangible Outcome/T. feedback/peer feedback:

Stress handouts, pronunciation activity
answers, S-S interaction, T. notes on overheard
errors
Activity 3:
Discussion of intonation and
dialogue activity

Pre-Stage:
3.1.1 Review the intonation patterns discussed WC
in the book on pp. 60-61- write the rules on the
board. Hand out the sample dialogue to the
students. Ask for 2 Ss to read it through one
time (with proper stress and intonation). Ask
the rest of the class to describe what the
dialogue was about and with whom it may
have occurred between.

5-7
min

3.1.2 Discuss vocabulary about emotions (more T-Ss

advanced vocab: grievance, contentment,
Ss-T
adoration, idolization, indifference, apathy).
Have Ss describe emotions that they know.
Make sure that when you introduce vocabulary
to the Ss you focus on 3-4 so that you dont
overload them with vocab.

5-7
min

3.1.3 Ask Ss about the inventors we discussed

from the previous class. They will need to
recall who the inventors are so that they are
able to complete the activity well.

WC

5 min

3.1.4 Split Ss into pairs. Give pairs the scenario T-Ss

cards. Tell the class that they will be given a
few minutes to read their scenario card and
practice portraying those emotions through
stress and intonation. They are to keep their
scenario secret because they will perform it for
the class, and the class will guess what scenario
they were performing.

2 min

During Stage:
3.2.1 Ss practice their dialogues and perform
S-S
for the class. Walk around to make sure
T-Ss
Transition to #4 or Wrap-up:
students understand their scenario as well as to
Hopefully stress and intonation
be available to make anything clear or to
patterns are clearer now. We will
answer any questions. Ss are encouraged to
review the material more
change the dialogue in order to fit their
throughout the semester. We are
scenario more effectively. This part of the
going to end the class on a lighter lesson can be very challenging. Make sure that
note by doing an activity similar to the Ss have plenty of time to prepare their
the one we did at the beginning of dialogue. They will struggle with using stress
last class.
and intonation alone to convey meaning, which
is why they may need to adapt the dialogue.
Post-Stage:
3.3.1 Ask Ss about the activity what was the
most challenging part? The easiest? How were
you able to guess the scenarios?

10 min

WC

5 min

T-Ss
Ss-T

2 min

Tangible Outcome/T. feedback/peer feedback:

Sample dialogue and Ss notes, scenario cards,
S-S interaction, T. notes on overheard errors
Activity 4:
Talk About It Activity on p. 57
(time-permitting)

Pre-Stage:
4.1.1 Remind the Ss about the activity from
last class where the Ss asked yes/no questions
to figure out which inventor their classmates
were thinking of. This activity is the reverse of
that one: 1 S will give clues about a famous
inventor and their group members will guess
who the inventor is. Split Ss into groups of 3.
Ss are encouraged to pick inventors they are

able to describe extensively. This activity is

pretty self-explanatory as it comes straight
from the textbook. It is a good activity to eat up
time if necessary!
During Stage:
4.2.1 Ss will complete the Talk About It
activity on p. 57. Monitor activities to make
sure Ss are participating and to be available to
answer questions.

WC

Post-Stage:
4.3.1 Discuss the activity what was simple,
WC
Transition to Wrap-Up: Thank you what was challenging, how long did it take you
for all your work and attention
to guess each one? Why do you think that was?
today. It is almost the end of class,
but before we go lets discuss the Tangible Outcome/T. feedback/peer feedback:
HW and whats in store for
S-S interaction, Ss notes, T. notes on
tomorrow.
overheard errors
Wrap-up

Lesson Evaluation Procedures: Encourage Ss

to look over materials about stress and
intonation patterns. Ask the class if there are
any lingering questions about these topics.

T-SS
SS-T

5-7
min

2-5
min

5 min

Assign HW: Skimming activity on pp. 63-65

Materials: PowerPoint Presentation (PPT), stress handout, Marie Curie dialogue, Intonation sample
dialogue, scenario index cards, chalk
Anticipated Problems & Suggested Solutions: The students may not understand how to designate stress
in words (the second part of the stress activity) if we run out of time, I will come back to this point in
another lesson will tell the students to use their intuition and knowledge of English to properly stress
syllables (they are advanced learners and have a relatively extensive knowledge of English.
The students may have more questions about the HW than I anticipated will send them descriptions of the
answers via email because we cannot dedicate a lot of time to HW review in class.
Students may have trouble recognizing when to use rising vs. rising-falling intonation patterns highlight
the fact that the sample dialogue contains the six different situations that the book discusses in the
pronunciation section draw their attention to the books examples if they are unable to find the situations
in the sample dialogue.
We run out of time and cannot complete all the activities keep a careful watch on the time and monitor
activities in order to get through them. If we run out of time, I will have to present the material that we
dont discuss in another class or assign HW that covers the material that we dont have time to discuss.
Contingency Plans (what you will do if you finish early, etc.): I planned Activity 4 in case we were able
to get through the stress and intonation activities quicker than I anticipate we will be able to.
Note on Lesson: Teaching stress and intonation takes some time for the students to understand. This lesson
was given after going through the pronunciation activity for the chapter with the students in a previous
class. If you decide to teach pronunciation, be prepared to spend a few lessons teaching, practicing, and
reviewing it.