Appearances can be deceptive!

I found this by accident on youtube - even though it is in French you can use this to show that appearances can be deceptive. I would show the start of the video -fixed and ask the students what type of person they think the singer is, what job she does .... and finally what type of song she is going to sing. (You can run the video to 12 seconds safely.) Bet they get it wrong!



You can then lead on to a discussion about appearances, stereotypes etc.

You're so vain - Past Simple regular and irregular.

Here is a song which I used with a fairly low level group to practise past simple verbs - some of them were having lots of problems with structure.

Idea from Toni Richart in the comments here englishlane.wordpress.com





Worksheet 

Can't get used to losing you

You can use this song to illustrate the pattern 'get used to + verb-ing'




Worksheet to follow

Who wrote the book of love - reading

I used this song to introduce the idea of reading. There are also some useful vocabulary embedded in the song!





Apart from the course, the lines are mixed up - the first line in each part is correct.

used to - Daughtry

Another song I found with lots of examples of 'used to' embedded.





The verbs after  used to have been removed and put in a separate list. Students can either predict and listen or listen and fill the gaps. There are also some nice verb phrases in here if you wanted to teach them :)

Used to for past habits and states

One of my new students told be about this song which she sings when walking up the stairs - unfortunately it is very hard to find clean copies on youtube due to licensing so this is from another site. I have not seen it before but avast tells me it is safe





The verses and adlibs are mixed up in this one.

Present Simple & Continuous - Say a little prayer

I used this song with my lower level group to review present simple and continuous tenses together. They show how they are used with words like while and now.





Enjoy - see if the students get carried away too!

Superlatives - I'm the coolest - Alice Cooper

I was looking for a song with superlatives in and found this one. The worksheet has extra words which the students need to remove. The song is quite slow so hopefully not too many problems for them.

Eat it - Food language

I found this song and used it to introduce/review some food language with a low intermediate group.

Why do fools - question order

I adapted this song for my elementary learners to review word order in questions - not too many difficult words




Worksheet

Day trip to Bangor - trips and journeys and English history

I used this song to introduce the idea of day trips and excursions as compared to holidays



Worksheet here



Some colloquial language 

a paddler boat - is often known as a pedalo these days - a boat with paddles that you powerlike a bicycle
a ferris wheel - a large vertical wheel on which people travel for pleasure - similar but not the same as the London Eye
the diddley bom tarara - nonsense words which make the sound of an old brass band
cider -  an alcoholic drink made of apples - similar but not the same as beer
mill - here refers to the cloth mills which were very common in the north of England in the early 1900's

Wonderful world - present simple

I rehashed this one for some low level students who said that English songs were to difficult for them to understand





Link to work sheet here