Should you take a gap year

This lesson plan is all about gap years and the advantages and disadvantages of taking one. It is useful for young adults and parents of teenage children. Students learn phrases relevant to the topic, watch an educational video and discuss the topic.

Vocabulary: after an initial discussion, students learn vocabulary to talk about different gap year experiences (volunteering, internship, backpacking). Then students talk about the kind of gap year they would like to do and they create a plan for their experience. Next, students learn words and expressions they are going to hear in the video (e.g. take a breather, seize an opportunity, boost your resume) and practise by completing different statements and sharing their personal experiences.

Listening: Students watch a video “You should take a gap year in 2022 and here is why”  (divided into 3 parts) and take notes about the pros and cons of a gap year. As an extension listening activity, students complete extracts from the video with the correct preposition to learn common phrasal verbs and expressions (end up, let someone down, figure out, bear in mind).

Speaking: This worksheet concludes with a role-play activity. Students take the roles of a parent and their teenage son/daughter and talk about gap years.

Homework: 3 research topics are suggested which aim to develop the topic further. The topics, combined with the additional resources provided on theenglishflows.com provide plenty of extra opportunities for contact with topic-related vocabulary in order to reinforce and enrich it