Idioms: surprise, shock and confusion

This ESL worksheet is about idioms that are used when expressing surprise, shock and confusion. It includes speaking activities (conversation questions, role-plays, sentence completion) so that students can learn them through practice.

The first 6 idioms (e.g. to catch someone off-guard, to wrap one’s head around something, didn’t see that coming, to drop a bombshell) are introduced through a short text. Students work out the meanings of the idioms from context and match them to their definitions. Then they complete a gap-fill activity to check understanding. Next, students complete 6 sentences with their own ideas and use them to start a conversation with a partner. As a last practice activity about the first group of idioms, students match the 2 halves of 6 questions and discuss the questions in pairs or small groups.

The rest of the idioms (e.g. to get our wires crossed, in a fog, to boggle the mind, to catch someone red-handed) are introduced through a multiple-choice activity: students look at a sentence containing the idiom and then decide which is the correct meaning out of 3 possible answers. To practice, they paraphrase 5 sentences, using the correct idiom. Finally, 2 role-play scenarios are given for students to practise all idioms from this lesson.

You can use the conversation cards to review the idioms and for some more speaking practice.