Tag: Text

Ways to Stop Over Apologizing

B2 – Upper Intermediate

An apology is telling someone how sorry you are for the pain or trouble you have caused them while promising that the bad behavior will not be repeated. However, are you the type of person who tends to over apologize ?

While it is a powerful tool for building trust, valuing the other person and your relationship with them, we sometimes need to assert our self-worth and try not to apologize for everything little thing so much.

Let’s read the ways on how to stop saying sorry too much.

https://www.thelawofattraction.com/stop-saying-sorry/

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is your opinion about the article?
  2. What makes a good apology?
  3. When apologizing, is it best to make it up with someone with a costly gift?
  4. How do you apologize for a personal and professional mistake?
  5. Should you apologize if you feel that you are right?

Health Benefits of Gardening

B2 – Upper Intermediate

Greens, colorful flowers, and vegetables, these are some views that will surely give us positive emotions. Feelings like amusement, appreciation, excitement, passion, happiness, and serenity will definitely have a great impact on our mental health.

Would you believe that you can achieve all these positive emotions in one activity? Yes! It’s gardening!

Here are the 8 surprising health benefits of gardening:

https://healthtalk.unchealthcare.org/health-benefits-of-gardening

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are the health benefits of gardening?
  2. Do you like gardening? Why or Why not?
  3. Do you have a garden? If yes, what are the plants that you have in your garden? If not, do you plan to put up a garden?
  4. Would you like to try growing your own food? Why or why not?
  5. According to WHO, good health means the presence of sense of community and happiness. Can you explain this?

The Rise of the Ripped Teen

B2 – Upper Intermediate

Elite is a popular 2018 Spanish thriller teen drama on Netflix. Perhaps one thing you will quickly notice about this show is how bulked up these high school students are! In a way, you’d think to yourself, that’s unrealistic, teens are normally not that buff. Safe to say, these teenagers do not only work on their studies now but on their bodies as well.

However, after reading this article, you might need to think again. The way these high schoolers are portrayed in that series could be true; that many people in their teens are all about abs and pecs now.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/may/09/anyone-popular-at-school-has-muscles-the-rise-of-the-ripped-teen

Discussion Questions:

  1. What might have led to this trend? What do you think are the good or a detrimental effects of this teens?
  2. What is your reaction to the rise of popularity of the muscular teens?
  3. Is this the same situation in your country? 
  4. What is your reaction to this: “If you’ve got a child who is overweight, you worry. I’ve got one who is extremely muscular and lean, and I still worry”?
  5. How would you compare teenagers’ hobbies and interests during your teenage years and now?

Cabin Fever

B2 – Upper Intermediate

After a long while being stuck indoors, we start feeling bored and restless. This is called “cabin fever”. It sounds like an actual disease but it is not. However, when one gets into this state, some effects could be being anxious, irritable, and even depressed caused by the long period of confinement in a tight or a remote, isolated space.

Read the article to learn more about cabin fever and be able to answer the questions below:

https://www.healthline.com/health/cabin-fever#symptoms

Discussion Questions:

  1. Have you ever had cabin fever before? If so, why and what happened?
  2. How did you cope or deal with it?
  3. What situations usually cause people to have it?
  4. What advice can you give to a person suffering from it?
  5. Are you a social hermit or a social butterfly?

Google Meet Video Conferencing Platform Improved

B1 – Intermediate

Video conferencing technology gives us the opportunity to communicate with our co-workers, friends, and family. It is changing rapidly over the past few years. Video conferencing is not only for business but also for education and healthcare. It boosts productivity, saves time, and reduces travel expenses.

Let’s read the article below.

https://breakingnewsenglish.com/2004/200429-google-meet.html

Discussion Questions:

  1. How is Google Meet helpful in education and healthcare and at work?
  2. What are some improvements in the Google Meet platform?
  3. What are your experiences video conferencing?
  4. What are the advantages and disadvantages of video conferencing?
  5. How did you communicate with your family and friends during lockdown? How has it changed since things went back to normal?

Things Healthiest People Have in Common

B2 – Upper Intermediate

The secret of longevity is mainly eating healthy food. However, it is also proven that the world’s healthiest people have the same habits, not only eating healthy food.

Learn the real secrets to healthy living by reading this article.

https://www.rdasia.com/healthsmart/fitness/17-things-worlds-healthiest-people-have-common?pages=2

 Discussion Questions:

  1. What can you say about the saying “health is wealth”?
  2. Do you do all these habits described in the article?
  3. Do you agree that these habits will keep you healthy?
  4. Aside from these habits mentioned in the article, what else do you think is helpful in providing major health benefits?
  5. What do you think of wellness institutions and their programs?
  6. From your own experience, can you give some examples of how the mind and the body are connected?

Nature Rebounding during Coronavirus

B2 – Upper Intermediate

More or less two months now since quarantine has started in most of the countries around the world. Obviously, we are experiencing adverse losses in the economy globally due to bounded outside activities. But amidst this pandemic that we are dealing with, our natural world is healing.

Let’s check some of the photos in different countries showing how nature is flourishing.

https://www.rdasia.com/culture/8-photos-that-show-nature-rebounding-during-coronavirus

Discussion Questions:

1.Is there any news in your place that reports nature’s healing during this lockdown?

2. What can you say about the photos that you’ve seen? Which one is your favorite?

3. Do you think people would do some efforts to maintain the improvement we’ve seen in nature even after this lockdown is over?

4. As a simple citizen, what can you do to help preserve our nature for the future generation?

The Most Dangerous Place in Earth’s History: Sahara Desert

B2 -Upper Intermediate

A team of scientists believe that an area of the Sahara desert in Morocco must be the most dangerous place on Earth. It was the home of terrifying array of ferocious predators. The report said that it was most uninhabitable place in Africa’s Age of Dinosaurs.

Let’s read the article and be ready to share your thoughts.

https://www.sciencealert.com/palaeontologists-say-ancient-sahara-was-most-dangerous-place-in-earth-s-history

Discussion Questions:

  1. Why is the Kem-Kem Group the most dangerous place in Earth’s history?
  2. What is your opinion about the article?
  3. What are some things scientists can learn from studying fossils?
  4. If you had to pick just one place as the most hostile or dangerous place of all on the entire planet, what would it be and why?
  5. How dangerous do you think the world is today? Support your answer with examples.

Couples Get Married Online in New York

B2 – Upper Intermediate

A wedding is without a doubt one of the most special days in a woman’s life. This is her big day. This day is all about her. That is why weddings have become a big global industry.

During this pandemic, most couples’ wedding ceremony had to be postponed but that is not entirely the case in New York.

Read the article about online weddings in New York.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/04/zoom-yorkers-wed-online-200419165225473.html

Discussion Questions:

  1. How is the online wedding procedure in New York?
  2. What is your opinion on online wedding?
  3. How do people in your country commonly get married?
  4. Share some traditional wedding practices in your country.
  5. Do you think this is one change we would eventually adapt even after the pandemic is over?

Men Should Grocery Shop During Pandemic

B2 – Upper Intermediate

Grocery shopping is one of the essentials that everyone should do in order to survive during this trying times. It has been an issue in some countries as they try to control the crowd of shoppers while abiding with the quarantine rules. One mayor in Japan had recently received backlash for stating that men should do the grocery shopping as women take longer which could lead to overcrowding at the supermarkets.

Read the article below for more details on this story and be ready to answer the questions for discussion.

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/24/asia/japan-coronavirus-osaka-mayor-hnk-scli-intl/index.html

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is your opinion on the mayor’s statement? Could it be considered a sexist remark?
  2. How do you plan your grocery shopping during the pandemic?
  3. Is there such thing as gender preference in effective grocery shopping?
  4. Based on your experience, make a comparison between men and women when it comes to grocery shopping.
  5. Describe your grocery runs during the pandemic.