The Price of the American Dream

This upper-intermediate lesson plan explores vocabulary related to wealth, success, and inequality.

Warm-up:

The lesson starts with students talking about the American Dream, how they understand it and whether it’s still alive today.

Video:

Students watch a video titled “Why A $100,000 Salary Can’t Buy The American Dream”. After watching the video, they answer a few questions related to the video.

Exercises:

This part starts with students matching phrases with their definitions. In the second exercise, the learners complete sentences with provided statistics. In the following exercise, they familiarize themselves with pros and cons of the American Dream. In the next exercise, students pick which aspects of the American Dream are described by a series of statements. 

Reading:

The students read a series of short texts about the benefits and drawbacks of the American Dream and share their opinions on the matter.

Discussion:

Students discuss with their teacher a series of questions related to the topic of the lesson. In the second part they play a pick a card game and share how they feel about a number of presented opinions.