Brazil carnival

With this intermediate ESL lesson plan for adults and teens, students will learn more about and discuss Carnival in Brazil, and Rio de Janeiro in particular. Students will learn interesting vocabulary (verbs, adjectives, and idioms) to talk about Carnival and other festivals, and will discuss this celebration in detail. Other video-based lessons you might find interesting are “Winter festivals”, and “Chinese New Year”. You can also take a look at the worksheet “Phrasal verbs: Carnival“.
Speaking: The lesson starts with 2 speaking activities. First, students talk about Brazil and its culture. Then, they are given photos of different aspects of Carnival, and are asked to describe what they are seeing.
Vocabulary: Students learn verbs that they will later hear when watching the video (to be fused with, to be traced back, to craft, to rehearse, to take over). They rewrite 7 sentences, using the correct verb. To activate this vocabulary, students discuss 7 questions given.
Listening: Students watch a video called “The Carnival chronicles: Unveiling Brazil’s spectacular secrets” and complete 2 activities: First, they decide if the statements given are true or false, and then they fill the gaps with the correct adjective (countless, open-air, mind-blowing, intricate, dazzling, world-renowned). After that students match the adjectives to their synonyms.
Vocabulary: Students look at a few sentences from the video, which contain interesting expressions and idioms (e.g. to wow the crowd, to let loose, to have the time of your life), and match the expressions to their definitions. Next, they complete 5 sentences with the correct expressions. Finally, they use the expressions using 4 speaking prompts given.
The last activity involves researching another carnival from around the world, finding interesting facts about it, and presenting the findings to the class, using vocabulary from this lesson.
For more speaking practice, you can use the printable conversation cards.