B1 ESL Video Lesson Plan: The Gift
This B1-level ESL video lesson plan is built around a thought-provoking video that explores the themes of love and relationships. It is designed to help learners develop key language skills—listening, viewing, speaking, reading, writing and visually representing—through guided discussion, roleplay, vocabulary building, and engaging classroom activities.
Check out the lesson planThis ESL video lesson plan is designed around a beautiful short animation titled The Gift and the themes of love and relationships. Students watch a trailer and predict a story, watch a short film and write a narrative based on it and discuss relationships.
Language level: Intermediate (B1) – Upper Intermediate (B2)
Learner type: Teens and adults
Time: 90 minutes
Activity: Watching trailer and a short film, writing and speaking
Topic: Romantic love and relationships
Language: Vocabulary related to romantic relationships
Benefits for Teachers:
- Save hours of preparation with a fully developed, flexible lesson plan
- Engage students through compelling stories and real-world themes such as emotional intelligence, character, values, empathy, personal development, identity, relationships, global issues and social issues
- Build classroom routines that integrate multimodal literacy naturally and progressively
- Foster more inclusive and differentiated learning by using varied modes of input
- Rely on a trusted methodology backed by educational research and grounded in the theories of Vygotsky, Kress, Mayer and Krashen
Benefits for Learners:
- Develop communicative competence and confidence through integrated skill-building
- Expand vocabulary and improve listening and reading comprehension through repeated, meaningful exposure
- Think critically and creatively while exploring powerful social and emotional themes
- Strengthen emotional intelligence and intercultural awareness through affective engagement with multimodal texts
Watch the film.
Check out the lesson plan
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Transform Your English Classroom with the Multimodal Approach
This ESL video lesson plan is built around a thought-provoking short video and designed using the innovative Multimodal Approach, integrating listening, speaking, reading, writing, viewing, and representing. Engage learners with real-world themes, develop communicative competence, build vocabulary and foster critical thinking through dynamic, research-informed activities. Find out more about the Multimodal Approach and join thousands of teachers transforming their classrooms with Film English.
Kind of weird, Kieran, or it seems that way at first! OK, maybe love is 😉 ! I really wasn’t sure what was supposed to be going on but I guess that probably makes it brilliant for use in class!
At around 6′!0″ the credits kick in but you need to hang about! At about 7’10” it starts up again! Not quite sure what we’re supposed to make of it (but again brilliant for class!). Does it change how the story ends?
Hi Tom,
Thanks a lot for commenting. The is kind of weird, but in a nice quirky sort of way. This quirkiness lends itself to lots of speculation in the classroom. The ending is very strange, but a nice touch.
All the best,
Kieran
Yes indeed — weird but quirky but as you say, it’s exactly that that leaves it open to speculation.
Love it when the guy starts snoring there at the end 😉 !!!
Yes, weird but wonderful!
Used this lesson plan tonight with a class of mid-high level university students and it was absolutely amazing. Well done and thanks!
Hi Greg,
Thanks for letting me know the class went so well.
All the best,
Kieran
It’s helpful and inspired. But the topic is not only about love,show us more interesting topic such as humanity, environment, development and current issues from all over the world, health etc
I’ll write about any topic which I choose to. There are over 130 lessons on a wide range of topics. If you want lessons on a specific topic which is not covered on the site I suggest you write your own lesson plans.
It was amazing, so much to say.
It is so inspiring and informative. good animated sample of love…
Thanks–my students loved this and it led to some wonderful conversations. Thrilled to have discovered your site–great work!
Hi Melisa,
Thanks for commenting. I’m really happy you like the lessons.
All the best,
Kieran
Hey Kieran,
I love the lesson, the film is great and really helped my students get a handle on narrative structure when they attempted to write their own. I think the silent nature of the film was particularly useful and helped my students map their own ideas onto it.
I turned the idea into a mini two week unit on dialogue and narrative writing, and was hoping to share it on my blog. I have put a link to some of the resources I made below, and will credit the website of course, but wondered if I would would mind if I did so?
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Ya373YKdKNW3wkD7dWj2mEPvkoghg4XHYlWmTroAjMo/edit?usp=sharing
Hi Theo,
Thanks a lot for commenting and for the kinfd words about the lesson; I’m very happy you and your students found it useful. Of course, you can share it on your blog.
All the best,
Kieran