Taxes

With this engaging intermediate ESL lesson students will learn a lot of useful expressions to talk about taxes, discuss various aspects of the tax system in their country and watch a video about tax brackets. You can combine this lesson with other money and economy-related lessons, such as “Inflation and young people”, “Can you retire in your 30s? (The FIRE movement)”, and “Phrasal verbs: Money”.

Speaking: The lesson begins with a few conversation questions about taxes, which can be discussed in pairs or with the whole class.

Reading: Students read a comparison between the tax systems in the UK and the US and complete 1 comprehension activity.

Vocabulary: Students complete the phrase given with the correct word (income tax, inheritance tax, council tax, value added tax, taxable income, to file a tax return, etc). All of the phrases appear in the texts. Next, students complete a few sentences with the correct expression, and then discuss 4 conversation questions.

Listening: Students watch a video “How tax brackets actually work” and complete a multiple-choice and a gap-fill activity. After that they have a discussion about the video and what they have learned from it.

Debate: Students are given 3 tax-related debate topics.
Writing and speaking (possibly assigned as a homework task): Students are asked to research the tax system of their country and present their findings to the class. The conversation cards provide an additional opportunity to practise and revise the target vocabulary from this lesson.