Ahoy hoy all! Being a reflective teacher, I think I have to accept that there are some things I like teaching more than others. Take for example, relative clauses…I’ve never been a fan of teaching them. “Might” on the other hand, now there’s something that’s fun to teach. To highlight that point, this is my second lesson on “might”.

The first can be found here.

I can’t quite put my finger on why, I think it might be because I feel that native speakers use it all the time but non-native speakers (in my humble opinion) tend to avoid it and favour “maybe”, especially at the lower levels. Whatever the reason, I love it and so here’s yet another lesson on it.

• Level: Pre-intermediate / intermediate
• Objective: by the end of the lesson the students will be better able to describe possible situations in the present & future.
• Aim: to encourage students to analyse the English all around them every day.
• Time: 60 – 90 minutes

Materials:

1. Might is all around us
2. Might is all around us – Teacher’s copy
3. Might – Practising the skill – picture 2

Procedure:

1. Test what they know: Give them the picture of Bob in the bin and let them come up with some ideas as to why he is there. I’ll bet you dollars for doughnuts you only get “maybe”. Put those sentences aside and tell the students you’ll be coming back to them later and you’ll be upgrading the language in them.
2. Intro: If your students aren’t currently living in an English speaking country, these intro questions would have to be tweaked. The idea is to encourage them to learn English from the ads all around them. However, these days, with social media regardless of where they are living, they are very often exposed to English ads.
3. Reading: For these questions, students will have to use the information in the ad itself but also their own world knowledge. If they are quite young or are struggling with these questions, you may need to encourage them to apply their world knowledge of these types of websites.
4. Alternative to the above: if students are struggling, you could always get them to look up Gumtree and find out what services it provides.
5. Language focus 1: having established the context, students should be able to answer the vocabulary questions. See the teacher’s copy for the answers.
6.  Language focus 2: Students work in pairs to analyse “might” and complete the rules. Check as a class and help with any questions.
7. Test what they have learnt: Students should be able to rewrite their sentences about Bob using “might”. Focus on reformulating any present sentences they gave earlier.
8. Practising the skill: it’s the skill of analysing language that’s really important here. Display the second ad and let them draw their own conclusions. E.g. what kind of person are they talking about, what patterns with “might” are there, and ultimately, how do we use “might” in the past?
9. Test what they have learnt 2: Bring Bob back in and let them consider how he got himself in this predicament. I’m sure there were a few examples from task 1. If not, let them come up with them now.
10. Note: at this point other uses of “might” might come up (e.g. might have done). If it comes up, I see no harm in teaching it.