Niceness

Lesson Summary:
This ready-to-use ESL video lesson plan is built around the short film In Praise of Nice People and explores the theme of appreciating nice people and niceness. Designed for Upper Intermediate (B2) to Advanced (C1) learners, it provides a complete 90–120 minute lesson with structured activities that develop viewing, listening, reading, speaking and writing skills. Students expand vocabulary related to human nature, gratitude and relationships, engage in discussion and roleplay, analyse quotations about kindness, and read an in-depth follow-up article titled Why We Take Niceness for Granted. Ideal for mature teens and adults, the lesson promotes reflection, critical thinking and meaningful communication.

Learning Objectives:
• Introduce the concept of appreciating nice people and niceness.
• Expand vocabulary related to human nature, gratitude and relationships.
• Develop viewing, listening and reading comprehension skills.
• Develop writing skills through creative tasks and new vocabulary.
• Improve speaking skills through discussion and roleplay.
• Practise critical thinking through analysis and reflection.
• Improve visual representing skills through multimodal homework tasks.

Lesson Activities:
• Warm-up discussion on nice people and niceness.
• Analysis of quotations about kindness.
• Prediction tasks before viewing the short video.
• Viewing comprehension activities.
• Post-viewing discussion and video analysis.
• Extended roleplay on appreciating nice people.
• Reading and analysis of the article Why We Take Niceness for Granted.
• Writing reflection and critical thinking tasks.

Learner Type:
Upper Intermediate (B2) to Advanced (C1), mature teens and adults.

Language Focus:
• Human nature and behaviour
• Gratitude and appreciation
• Relationships and emotional awareness
• Reflection and evaluation vocabulary

Transform Your English Classroom with This Film English Multimodal Lesson

This ESL video lesson plan is built around a carefully selected short video and designed using the exclusive Multimodal Approach– an innovative methodology that integrates traditional language skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) with viewing – the active process of analysing and interpreting multimodal texts – and representing – creating multimodal texts. This pedagogically rich approach mirrors how communication works in the real world, through a combination of language, image, sound, gesture and spatial design, making the lesson more engaging, relevant and effective.

This ESL video lesson plan plan consists of a complete, ready-to-use package that includes:

• A thought-provoking short video
• A detailed teacher’s guide with step-by-step instructions
• A pre-viewing vocabulary glossary to scaffold understanding
• Comprehension, discussion and critical thinking questions
• Creative post-viewing tasks such as roleplays, writing prompts and reflective activities
• A thematically linked reading text to reinforce language and deepen understanding
• A final task encouraging learners to create their own multimodal compositions (e.g. vlogs, posters, infographics or social media posts)

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
• Promote social-emotional learning (SEL)
• 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
• Create authentic, personalised multimodal projects that reflect their own voice and ideas
• Strengthen emotional intelligence and intercultural awareness through affective engagement with multimodal texts

Whether you’re teaching in a secondary school, university or adult education context, Film English lesson plans offer a dynamic, research-informed pathway to meaningful language learning. Join thousands of teachers worldwide who are transforming their classrooms with the Multimodal Approach and helping their students learn English—and live through English—more fully.

Watch the short video.