Exciting and Action-Packed ESL Lessons on Thrilling Sports!
This unit from SuperEnglishESL.com introduces students to the world of extreme sports, exploring high-adrenaline activities like parkour, skateboarding, rock climbing, skydiving, and surfing. Students will build their reading comprehension, vocabulary, and grammar skills while engaging in exciting discussions and interactive exercises.
Through structured lessons, role-plays, and real-life applications, students will improve their speaking confidence and critical thinking skills while learning about the risks, challenges, and rewards of extreme sports. This unit is perfect for 1:1 online lessons, group classes, or classroom instruction and includes downloadable worksheets, interactive activities, and engaging reading materials.
Students are introduced to parkour, a sport where athletes navigate urban environments by climbing, jumping, and vaulting over obstacles. They will explore how parkour started in France, its rise in popularity, and its role in competitions today.
✔️ Warm-up: Word articulation game – describe and guess vocabulary
✔️ Reading & Discussion: The origins of parkour, famous athletes, and its challenges
✔️ Vocabulary Focus: Extreme, sprint, notice, skill
✔️ Grammar & Sentence Structures: Using “wish” for present regrets (e.g., “I wish I could do parkour”)
✔️ Pronunciation/Phonics: Words ending in -cious and -tious (/shus/ sound)
✔️ Interactive Elements: Role-play a conversation about a parkour competition
✔️ Real-Life Applications: Discussing the importance of practice and safety in extreme sports
Students will learn about skateboarding, from its roots in California’s surf culture to its inclusion in the X Games. They will read about vert ramps, different skateboarding styles, and famous skateboarders.
✔️ Warm-up: “Would you rather?” extreme sports edition
✔️ Reading & Discussion: The history and evolution of skateboarding, tricks, and competitions
✔️ Vocabulary Focus: Ramp, crouch, gain, score
✔️ Grammar & Sentence Structures: Using “wish” with past simple (e.g., “I wish I were a great skateboarder”)
✔️ Pronunciation/Phonics: Words ending in -cial and -tial (/shul/ sound)
✔️ Interactive Elements: Role-play about watching a skateboarding event
✔️ Real-Life Applications: Discussing perseverance, practice, and competition
Students will explore rock climbing, learning about different styles such as bouldering, free soloing, and traditional climbing. They will also discuss safety gear and famous climbers.
✔️ Warm-up: Name things from different categories starting with a given letter
✔️ Reading & Discussion: The history of rock climbing, climbing techniques, and safety precautions
✔️ Vocabulary Focus: Harness, hammer, artificial, cushion
✔️ Grammar & Sentence Structures: Using “wish” with past perfect (e.g., “I wish I had brought my helmet”)
✔️ Pronunciation/Phonics: More -cious and -tious words
✔️ Interactive Elements: Role-play about forgetting safety equipment at a climbing gym
✔️ Real-Life Applications: Discussing the importance of teamwork and preparation
This lesson introduces students to the thrill of skydiving, from historical first jumps to modern safety measures. They will discuss different skydiving styles, such as formation and freestyle skydiving, and the risks involved.
✔️ Warm-up: Fill in the blanks with extreme sports-related words
✔️ Reading & Discussion: How skydiving works, equipment, and competition formats
✔️ Vocabulary Focus: Parachute, cord, formation, accurate
✔️ Grammar & Sentence Structures: Using “wish” for the future (e.g., “I wish I could try skydiving one day”)
✔️ Pronunciation/Phonics: Words with -cial and -tial endings
✔️ Interactive Elements: Role-play a discussion about trying skydiving
✔️ Real-Life Applications: Discussing personal fears and overcoming challenges
The final lesson serves as a review and assessment, covering all previously learned vocabulary, grammar, and extreme sports concepts. Students will also learn about surfing, its Polynesian origins, and modern surf competitions.
✔️ Warm-up: “Guess the Word” game with extreme sports vocabulary
✔️ Assessment Tasks:
✅ ESL learners at A2+ – B1 levels (pre-intermediate to intermediate)
✅ Kids and Teens in online 1:1 lessons, group classes, or traditional classrooms
✅ Teachers looking for structured, engaging, and interactive lessons on action-packed sports
📄 Lesson previews & worksheets
🎲 Games & vocabulary activities
📚 Reading passages & discussion questions
🔊 Pronunciation & sentence-building exercises
📌 Encourage students to share their experiences with sports they’ve tried.
📌 Use videos of extreme sports to make discussions more engaging.
📌 Have students debate which extreme sport is the most exciting or the most dangerous.