The rise of podcasts

Our speaking lessons follow a consistent six-stage structure: warm-up, presentation (with video, images, or reading), controlled practice, free conversation, deeper discussion, and a final homework task to introduce in class.

Lessons come with a printable student worksheet and a teacher version containing notes and answers. For online teaching, we provide an editable Google Slides e-lesson that can be downloaded or exported to PowerPoint.

The purpose of this stage is to activate your students' existing knowledge and prepare them for the lesson's theme.

Activity 1: You will lead a warm-up discussion by asking students questions on the topic of podcasts, gradually narrowing to their personal experiences and knowledge of the podcast phenomenon.

Activity 2: Students attempt to guess statistics related to podcasting, discuss their opinions, and reflect on the answers.

The presentation material for this lesson is a video from The Verge titled ‘How podcasts became so popular’.

Activity 3: Students have to match key words or phrases from the video they are about to watch to statements that describe them.

Activity 4: Students watch the video and answer comprehension questions.

Activity 5: Students will consider several statements related to podcasts and indicate whether they agree, disagree, or partially agree.

To reinforce their understanding of the new language or concepts introduced in the lesson, the students will work on a couple of controlled practice activities.

Activity 6: Students rank podcast genres based on their preferences and discuss their choices with a partner.

Activity 7: Each student works from a different set of questions and then interviews their partner.

We move into free practice for this stage, where the students apply the language in more open-ended, communicative activities.

Activity 8: The students will work in teams to create and pitch a completely original podcast idea to a media executive, focusing on how it will stand out in the competitive podcasting space.

Activity 9: Students discuss questions related to the topic of misinformation on podcasts.

This stage allows students to explore the lesson’s theme in more depth, tackling complex ideas and expressing their thoughts and opinions on related topics.

Activity 10: Students debate whether books or podcasts are better for learning, with one team supporting books and the other supporting podcasts.

Activity 11: The students discuss a recent news event, and consider its wider implications for society.

Finally, we'll encourage students to extend their learning outside of the classroom to reinforce the language and concepts covered during the lesson.

Homework task: Students will watch a video about podcast trends and answer questions to reflect on its content.