Note: Paid subscribers can download all four complete lesson packages at the end of the post.
For most of my teaching life, I taught the lessons I thought my students needed. This term, for the first time, I asked them.
That sounds like an obvious thing to do, but in thirty years of teaching it was never really an option. I didn’t have the tools to build lessons quickly enough to offer genuine choice, so the idea of surveying a class and letting them steer was something I couldn’t seriously consider. And honestly, I was a little afraid to ask — what if they wanted something I simply couldn’t deliver?
Working with AI has changed that. I can now develop so many lessons that real choice is finally on the table. So I surveyed my class and asked a simple question: of everything we could study - about 60 options - what do you actually want?
The answer turned out to be a kind of confirmation. The new topics I’ve introduced over the past few years were exactly the ones they reached for: soft skills, social interaction, and communication at work were among the most chosen. After all this time, it was reassuring to see my instincts were largely right. Just as usefully, the survey showed me where to put my energy next.
This week’s lessons aim to expand the library and give students more to choose from down the track. They’re built around idioms and expressions for workplace communication. I used to teach idioms as standalone vocabulary exercises, but idioms take a while to fully absorb — so these four lessons are designed to be more comprehensive and reinforcing: focused, contextual, and built to be used in conversation rather than just recognized on a page.
Doing the Job Well — learn idioms through brainstorming, visual vocabulary, dialogue and lecture listening, a grammar role play, and a “Run Your Own Business” talk zone.
Projects and Teamwork — workplace idioms for getting things done together, with critical-thinking sets on spotting mistakes and handling difficult topics at work.
Strategizing — expressions for planning and decision-making, including a “Strategy in the Age of AI” discussion and an app-launch flowchart reading.
Time Management & Prioritization · fully revised — rebuilt with retail, restaurant, and office prioritization scenarios, role plays, and a “Discover Your Time Management Style” self-assessment quiz.
This is the part I find most satisfying. Now that I can see which lessons students value most, I get to go back and fine-tune them — adding things like self-assessment quizzes for soft skills, sharpening the exercises, and making the good ones better. The survey didn’t just tell me what to teach. It told me what to keep improving.
