LESSON OVERVIEW

The main objectives of this beginner lesson on online meetings are to:

• discuss online meetings from different perspectives;
• practise functional language for virtual meetings;
• listen to conversations and watch a short video related to video conferences.

Students discuss work meetings, explore online and offline meeting tools and review phrases related to online communication (e.g., turn on the camera, hear you well, use a laptop). They discuss tips and reflect on their habits in virtual meetings. Students work with dialogues, listen to conversations people have in online meetings and watch a humorous video about a new project. They also study functional language for online meetings (e.g. I think you’re on mute) and use it to do a role-play activity.

WARM-UP AND DISCUSSION

This beginner lesson on online meetings starts with a warm-up. Students consider items for both ‘online meeting’ and ‘offline meeting’ (e.g., camera, table). They use photos to help them. After that, students discuss questions about work meetings. They then look at pictures related to meetings and read phrases that describe them (e.g. turn on the camera, hear you well, use a laptop). Afterwards, students complete tips for professional online meetings with the phrases (e.g. buy a good microphone so people can hear you well). Moving on, they choose the tips from the previous task that are important to them. Following that, students complete statements about personal habits in online meetings by choosing the answer that is true for them (e.g. I speak/don’t speak English in meetings). 

FUNCTIONAL LANGUAGE AND VIDEO

In this part of this beginner lesson on online meetings, students match dialogues that people have in online meetings with pictures. Next, they listen to the dialogues and complete them by choosing the words they hear. Afterwards, students watch a humorous video where people are excited in a virtual meeting. They choose the reason why the people in the video are excited. After that, students watch the video again and choose the sentences they hear. Moving on, they fill in the gaps to complete functional language for online meetings (e.g. Could you repeat that, please?). Following that, students get a card with three situations. They decide what to say in each situation using the picture and the word on their card (e.g. start – I am so excited to start this project). Their partner needs to respond. They then swap roles.

HOMEWORK/REVISION

This beginner lesson on online meetings also includes an additional task that you can use as homework or revision. In the task, students complete short dialogues with words from the lesson. The task is available in the teacher’s version of the worksheet. You can print it and hand it out to your students. It’s also included in the e-lesson plan.