Morocco earthquake
Lesson plan overview
This breaking news ESL lesson plan is about the devastating earthquake that struck Morocco on 8 September. Students will learn vocabulary to talk about earthquakes and their consequences, read about the Morocco earthquake and watch a video analysing the reasons why the earthquake has been so deadly. Note that this lessons shares a couple of vocabulary and speaking activities with the lesson plan “Turkey-Syria earthquake“. This lesson plan could be combined with the lesson “Tackling rising sea levels“, where the topic of natural disasters is discussed, as well as “Phrasal verbs: natural disasters” and “Phrasal verbs: the environment”.
The lesson starts with a speaking activity, which doubles down as a vocabulary activity: students are given 5 questions about earthquakes. First they match the words and expressions in bold to their definitions (e.g. to be prone to, impending earthquake, warning signs, safety measures). After that they discuss the questions. Then, students look at different consequences and discuss how each of them is related to the topic of earthquakes. Then they match the details given to the correct consequence. This activity introduces key vocabulary (aid and relief efforts, shelter, displacement, collapse..
Speaking: Students talk about their personal experiences related to earthquakes and earthquake preparedness by matching 7 halves of questions and then discussing the questions.
Practice: Students read a short text about the earthquake that struck Morocco and complete it with the words given.
Listening: Students watch a video “Why Morocco’s earthquake was so deadly” and take notes about points given.
Speaking: The last activity is focused on speaking: students discuss what they should do in the event of an earthquake.
The conversation cards provide additional questions on the topic of earthquakes.
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Teacher’s lesson plan
Student’s worksheet
Student’s interactive PDF
Conversation cards PDF
Pre-class activities
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In-class activities
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Additional resources
Each video-based lesson plan includes links to additional resources (videos and articles), which are FREE can be found online (in the pre-class activities page. These links aim to extend the learning experience, enabling students to connect classroom knowledge with real-world applications.
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Teacher’s lesson plan
Student’s worksheet
Student’s interactive PDF
Conversation cards PDF
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