This is a collection of activities that I've used for a corporate class. They're patterned on the article discussion activities on the site Breaking News English. So far, the format has been:
- I send the articles to students ahead of time to read (I send the first two pages). Alternately, you can have the students read the articles in class. I've edited the articles to fit on one page to make them easier to read. I always provide a link to the full article.
- I go over all of the key vocabulary words on the second page to make sure everyone understands them.
- Next, the students make pairs and ask each other the pair discussion questions on the third page. One student asks questions from "A" and one from "B." I usually have three or four students, so I have them talk in pairs for 6 minutes, switch partners, and then talk in the new pair for 6 minutes.
- The fourth page is a general discussion activity. Sometimes I'll ask each student to advocate for one of four positions, or think of the good aspects and bad aspects of a certain thing, or something similar. This can be altered to fit whatever the class is, but the intent is to demonstrate knowledge of the subject matter and think about how it fits in with the bigger picture. Usually if there's a blank in this part, it means that the students can fill in their own ideas (like choosing an industry).
You may need to adjust these depending on your situation and students. The students I'm making this for are all quite advanced in English and wanted to cover business-related topics. There are some questions and scenarios that are current as I write these in 2020, but may need to be changed as the years go on.
You may be able to adjust these to general adult conversation classes or maybe even advanced high school or university-level classes. They're a bit dry but I've tried to cover a lot of important business concepts and vocabulary. I fit these all into an hour lesson, but it usually requires some open discussion at the end about the concepts of the material.