12th February 2024

Teaching English as a foreign language in your favourite destination can be rewarding at the same time. One of the challenging situations that every ESL teacher will find themselves in eventually where they need to come up with last-minute ESL lesson plans.

Let’s get to know some of the effective quick and easy ESL lesson ideas for last minute which could give you the confidence to deal with last-minute challenging situations that you might face in your ESL classroom.

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So, without any further delay, let’s get started.

Top Quick and Easy ESL Lesson Ideas For Last Minute

No matter, how prepared you are to teach in physical class or in online class, it’s quite possible that you still find yourself where you’re doing everything right according to your schedule and plans.

However, sometimes you might end up in a situation where you need to conduct class and you are not prepared like- your colleague is not present and you have to teach on behalf of them, or for any other reasons.

This kind of situation can be quite daunting, especially for new ESL teachers. But, there’s no need to worry because we are going to share some quick and easy ESL lesson ideas for the last minute, which will prepare you to conduct any ESL class for which you have little or no preparation.

1. Be Always Prepared

Early preparation is always the key to every individual success in every profession, the same goes for the ESL teaching profession as well. Before conducting the class, take 10-15 minutes to prepare for the lesson you will teach, which gives you more confidence to conduct your ESL class.

2. Always Have Back-Up ESL Lesson

At the beginning of every academic year, you get to know the student’s English proficiency level and their age groups as well. We would suggest you take advantage of this information and make early preparations for any uncertain situation.

You can make early preparations for each topic like- vocabulary, grammar, punctuation, or others and keep it in your notebook or your laptop. This will make your ESL teaching journey easy and you can utilize these ready-made lessons in last-minute classes, which you might need to conduct.
 

3. Make Your ESL Lesson from Scratch

Well, you could need to cover some topics that you haven’t prepared earlier then you can even develop your ESL lesson from scratch at the last minute. Let’s get to know last-minute ESL lesson plans with no textbook or without early preparation.

i. Warm-Up Your ESL Students English

Before the beginning of your ESL class, it’s best for you to make your students comfortable and have conversations with them. Take 5-10 mins to engage every ESL student by having common interactions like- How do you spend your weekend? Are you excited for today’s ESL class?

ii. Recycle Their Learning Memory

After warming up your student’s English you can refresh your student’s last lesson which they have learned. Because repetition is one of the key methods to learn any language. Take the time to revisit the last class lesson to recycle your student’s English learning memory.

iii. Engage Them in your ESL Lesson

After the revision of previously learned lessons, it’s time to bring their attention to the current lesson or activities that you’re planning to teach. You can consider incorporating a few impromptu ESL activities to fill the time.

Below we have shared a few fun and quick ESL vocabulary activities for beginners:
 

• You can teach new vocabulary and instruct each ESL student to choose any of their peers to form a pair to categorize words into different groups or you can instruct them to read it through a chapter with those words as a class.
   
• Secondly, you can opt for fun ESL games for unplanned lessons like- True/False Game, Picture Mingle, and Hot Seat. To know more about these games you can watch the below video.

Last Minute Lesson Plans Have Become Easier

Whether you’re an experienced or an aspiring TEFL teacher, sooner or later you may find yourself in a situation where have to conduct ESL class and you have to think on your feet to come up with last minute ESL lesson plan.

However, there's no need to worry, our blog post has covered some of the quick and easy ESL lesson ideas for the last-minute which can prove to be a lifesaver for the whole ESL teaching community.

Moreover, we wish that you don’t have to face this situation often where you have to create an ESL lesson plan and we also wish that the above-mentioned tips can help you to deal with this situation confidently.

Preparing early is always the best solution. You can also prepare yourself by pursuing courses like Live Online TEFL Course to come up with a last-minute ESL lesson plan without breaking a sweat.

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Written By: Rimpa Ghosh