A lesson for B1.2-C1 adults or older teens. It focuses on these skills: speaking, reading, vocabulary, listening, prepositions, and collocations. All materials are available for download at the bottom of this post.
I designed this lesson specifically for my adult B1.2 student who loves flamenco. The weekend before the lesson, she’d performed in a flamenco show. She does flamenco every week and loves to show me photos and videos of her flamenco dresses and performances. As every ESL teacher knows, the more you can tailor a lesson to your students’ passions, the more excited they will be to talk about it in English. And she did indeed love it!
In my first week as a resident in Barcelona, I watched a flamenco show at City Hall. I found it utterly captivating; the combination of raw emotion, grace, and the pure talent of the dancers and musicians rooted me to my seat. Performances can be seen in different cities across Spain, from Seville to Madrid, and it’s one of Spain’s most authentic art forms. Or is it? That’s the question addressed in this lesson, based entirely around the video below.
How do you run this flamenco-themed ESL lesson?
Here’s an overview:
- Warm-up (5 minutes). Students are presented with one third of a picture of a flamenco performance and need to predict the theme of the lesson. A second section is shown after.
- Discussion (5 minutes): students discuss their experience with flamenco.
- Pre-video vocabulary task (10 minutes): students match vocabulary with their definitions.
- Prediction discussion task (5 minutes): students try to predict the video’s content.
- Video and discussion (10 minutes): Students watch the video and check their predictions. Discussion questions.
- Prepositions practise (10 min): gap fill task using the transcript from the video.
- Discussion (5 min): discussion questions.
- Freer production/discussion (10 minutes): Students move around the room learning about each other’s cultures, using the focus vocabulary.
The focus vocabulary is: encompasses, fuelled by, delve deeper into, disputed, drew from, woven into, shift focus to, attribute to, scatter across, hold more weight, emerged from, sowing seeds for.
From a grammar standpoint, the main focus is intermediate to advanced prepositions and collocations.
An example of one of the discussion slides.
Which ESL students is ¡Olé! Feel the flamenco best suited to?
Intermediate to advanced English learners who are also flamenco lovers! Or any students who are interested in arts/culture/traditions. It works for adults and older teenagers (16-18 years).
How long does this ESL lesson take?
One hour. However, you could adapt it in different ways to extend it. For example, you could ask your students to complete a writing task on the topic of cultural blends, using the vocabulary in focus. Or you could ask your students to work in pairs to create a vision board/art project on the topic and present it back to the class. Make sure you provide more than enough arts and crafts materials for your students if you go down this route.
The Takeaway
This ESL lesson for flamenco lovers is sure to be a hit with your more culturally curious students. It’s interesting, educational and thought-provoking. More importantly, it’s bound to get your students talking, and you will undoubtedly learn a thing or two, as well!
Download ESL Lesson: ¡Olé! Feel the flamenco
What was your experience with this lesson? If you have any thoughts, feedback, or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment below!