Back to school: a parents’ guide

This A2–B1 ESL lesson focuses on back-to-school routines, school preparation, and family life during the school year and is ideal to teach after the summer vacation. Students learn practical vocabulary for school supplies, daily routines and getting ready for the new school year while discussing common back-to-school challenges and responsibilities. The lesson is designed to help learners use everyday English to talk about routines, compare holiday and school-year schedules, and discuss practical solutions to problems families may face when school starts. Other lessons you might like are: “Back to work after a vacation” and “Returning to work after a vacation“.

Speaking: Comparing routines: holidays vs. school year

Students discuss questions about busy September schedules, back-to-school shopping, homework, and sources of stress during the first week of school. They then compare their family’s routines during the holidays and the school year. They discuss wake-up times, bedtimes, breakfast, screen time, free time, and activities.

Vocabulary: Back-to-school preparation

Students learn and practise useful collocations for things to do before the school year starts. They work with verbs and expressions such as pack the school bag, enrol a child in an extracurricular activity, arrange school drop-off and pick-up, attend a parent-teacher meeting, contact a teacher, submit paperwork, buy school supplies, schedule health check-ups, label belongings, provide emergency contact information, get back into a morning routine, and set up a homework and study space. They then discuss when these tasks should be completed and what usually happens in their families in practice.

Vocabuary: School supplies

Students identify and practise vocabulary for common school supplies, including pencils, pens, notebooks, pencil cases, erasers, rulers, glue, scissors, calculators, water bottles, lunchboxes, school uniforms, paints, watercolors, and brushes. They then discuss which supplies families buy each year, which can be reused, who pays for school materials, school meals, and financial assistance for families.

Listening

Students watch a video called “Tips for parents and children getting ready for back to school“ and complete a listening task based on key information from the video.

Speaking: 

After watching the video, students discuss the expert’s advice and relate it to their own families. They consider which tips would be most useful, which would be difficult to follow, what causes stress in their family’s mornings, and what they could change to make mornings easier. Finally, Students discuss common back-to-school problems faced by parents and children and suggest possible solutions. Situations include children refusing to do homework, struggling to wake up early, disliking school food, forgetting school supplies, refusing to wear a school uniform, skipping breakfast, and forgetting to bring things home from school.

This A2–B1 ESL back-to-school lesson is suitable for teachers looking for engaging back-to-school English activities, family routine speaking activities, school vocabulary worksheets, and practical ESL discussion topics for adult learners or parents.