Trust Your Gut

Lesson Summary

This ESL lesson plan is based on the short animated video Why You Shouldn’t Second Guess Your Decisions. It encourages students to explore why people question past decisions, how emotions influence their memories and when they should trust their original judgement or intuition.

Learning Objectives

• Discuss decision-making, regret and intuition.

• Explore why people question decisions that once seemed right.

• Distinguish thoughtful reconsideration from unhelpful second-guessing.

• Develop viewing, listening and reading comprehension skills.

• Improve speaking and writing skills through discussion, roleplay and reflection.

• Develop critical-thinking and visual representing skills.

Lesson Activities

• Rank and discuss major life decisions.

• Explore intuition, gut feelings and second-guessing.

• Discuss a quotation about intuition.

• Predict the content of a short animated video.

• Watch and analyse the video.

• Answer video comprehension questions.

• Perform a decision-making roleplay.

• Read Why We Question Decisions That Once Seemed Right.

• Complete article comprehension and discussion activities.

• Undertake reflective writing and multimodal homework tasks.

Learner Type

• Mature teens and adults

Language Level

• Upper Intermediate (B2)–Advanced (C1)

Language Focus

• Vocabulary related to decision-making, regret and intuition.

• Expressions for questioning past choices and trusting your gut.

• Language for giving opinions, evaluating evidence and reconsidering decisions.

Lesson Time

• 90–120 minutes

Watch the short video.

Transform Your English Classroom with This Film English Multimodal Lesson

This ESL 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.