Homes: Tiny houses

Objective & content

This Look Closer episode (Homes mini-series, episode 91) is a one-minute documentary about a tiny house on wheels in the United States, told with real photos and drawings. A single narrator explains that a tiny house is usually smaller than thirty-seven square metres, that many things inside have two jobs (the stairs are also cupboards, the table folds down from the wall) and that the bed is often in a loft, then gives the reasons people choose one and its problem. Learners meet comparatives with than (smaller than many classrooms, cheaper than a big one), can for what the owners are able to do (The owners can take their house to a new town), there isn't much ..., the present simple to describe a home (it uses less energy), and a closing question, Could you live in a tiny house?. The vocabulary is about the house and its furniture, size and energy. Learners listen, then answer the 10 questions in the app: 8 on facts and 2 on vocabulary (tiny, loft).

Materials & prerequisites

You need the episode (audio and slideshow) and the printables: a one-page pupil pack and teacher pack (the text, three pictures, the key words and the 10 questions, with the answers highlighted in the teacher pack), a pupil question sheet and a teacher answer key. There is no lesson plan. Learners should know basic words for a home (house, bed, table, wall) and the present simple with it. Tiny and loft are explained in the episode; wheels, stairs and cupboards are shown in the pictures.

Curriculum alignment

Tagged daily-life-living-playing-learning (6e, "Le quotidien : vivre, jouer, apprendre", study topic "The living spaces of students in English-speaking countries", Cycle 3). The episode targets CEFR level A1+.