Numbers Discussion Questions for ESL

What are they?  What are they used for?  Can you give some examples of numbers being used?

Do you use numbers everyday in your life? Work? School? Play?

Are you good with numbers?  Are you scared of numbers?  Do you like working with numbers?

Do you have a favorite number? Lucky number?  Unlucky number?  Would you live in a number 4 house?

What numbers are important to you?  Why? What numbers are interesting to you?  What numbers are in the news?

What numbers do you see everyday?

Can you easily remember numbers?  e.g. Phone, license, ID

What numbers are you?  What numbers have you been?  What number do you want to be?

Have you heard of prime numbers?  What is the largest prime number you can tell me?

Do numbers have magical qualities?  Do you like Numerology?  e.g. My birthday numbers 12/24/64 add up to 100.  12+24+64=100

Idioms

Taking care of number one.

There is safety in numbers.

He has a sixth sense

I am having second thoughts.

I need to get my forty winks.

You days are numbered.

Number Association

(*Ask the students what these numbers make them think of.  

e.g. 12.  I can drink 12 beers.  These are 12 months in a year.  Yvon Cournyer was #12.*)

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9

13

23

32

81

100

666

1000

1949

1776

10,000

1,300,000,000

34,000,000

3.14

9.8

1,000,000

Number Pronunciation

1234

1,234,567,890,123

1001.000009

1/3

Discussion Questions about Names

What are names?

Why do we have names?

Do you like your name?  Do you want to change it?

In the West, we choose names because we like the sound of them.  What about in China?  Do you choose names because of the meaning?

Would you prefer to have a number instead of a name?  Why not?

Who has an interesting name?

What is the most popular name in China?

Do you wish you had many names?  e.g. Aliases, nicknames, pen names.  

What County's people do you think have the most interesting names?  Unpronounceable names?  Silly-sounding names?  

Do you like English names?  How did you choose your English name?

To a foreigner, Chinese names are hard to remember, and we can't know the gender.  What about English names to a Chinese person?

Nicknames

What are they?  Give examples.

My examples:  Metal, Four eyes, Harry Potter, Fishface.

What nicknames can you remember?

What sports teams nicknames do you like?

If Wuxi had a major sports team, what nickname should it have?

City nicknames.  E.g. New York is the Big Apple.  What nicknames would you give to Chinese cities?

Pet names

What are some good names for pets?  What names have you given pets? Birds? Dogs? Fish?

What names sound tough, effeminate, or weak?

What names are so infamous, you would never choose them?

Do people in China name their children after famous people?  Do people in China names their children after themselves?  e.g. Andis junior.

Do you wish you had a title?  e.g. King, Sir, Lady, Duke, Earl, Viscount

List of names

Ask the students what the names mean to them?  e.g. Nationality, gender, something about the person's desired personality.

Clint Eastwood

Rock Hudson

"Battleship" Kelly

"Baby Fats" Larry.

Hirohito

Sunil Gavaskar

Ichiro Suzuki

Gilles Gilbert

Kaka

Hans Zimmerman

Bruce

John Smith

Arjumuna Buru (Indian female)

Wang Xiao Fe

Hildegrad Nef (German actress)

Jane Doe

Rupert Baxter

Ho Chi Minh

Johnny Buick

Richard Wainwright the Third

Domenico Fontana

Central Asian Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov

Mohamed Atta

Angus McAllister

Lady Dora Garland

Geronimo

Don Felipe Juan Froilán de Todos los Santos de Marichalar y Borbón

Jean Florette

Juanita  Fernandez Solar

Jurgen Prochnow

Booker T Washington

Sitting Bull

Indira Kumir

Tom O'Grady

Lord Stockheath Percy

Ear Discussion Questions and Idioms

What are they?

Do you like your ears?  Why?  Why not?

What do we do with our ears?  Listen/hear?  Keep our balance.

What do we call people who can't hear?  Deaf. (blind can see)

Would you rather be deaf or blind?   Why?

Do some people have attractive ears?  Ugly ears

Beautiful ears are_________________.

Ugly ears are__________________.

What do you think of people with big ears?

Are your ears too big or too small?

Would you marry a man with pointy ears or ears like a rabbit?

Would you marry a woman with misshapen ears?

Do you sometimes wear ear plugs?

Have you lost your hearing or some hearing ability?

What jobs would be bad for your ears?

What experiences are bad for your ears?

Have your ears ever been "ringing"?

Have you ever heard a noise so loud that it hurt your ears?  What happened?

What do we hear? Sounds.  What sounds do you like?  Do you know what your mother sounds like when she walks?

Idioms

Use your ears!

Lend me your ears!

He's got a good ear!

I'm all ears!

He has a tin ear!

In one ear and out the other!

He is wet behind the ears!

Mind if I bend your ear!

Falls on deaf ear!

Have my ear to the ground!

That's music to my ears!

Talk my ear off!

We will play if by ear!

Throw out on ears!

Turn a deaf ear to!

Sympathy and Empathy ESL Discussion Questions

Sympathy and Empathy

Do you care? Does suffering of strangers make you sad. Or do you forget about it? Are we responsible for others? Is everyone our brother or sister?

Does anyone know what Sympathy or Empathy is? (*Chances are, they won’t, so explain the words best you can.*)

Sympathy and Empathy are both feelings.

With sympathy you feel for the person. You feel sorry or pity for the person.You can imagine their suffering. I imagine your pain.

Empathy is sharing a feeling with someone. I feel your pain.

(*We sympathize with people whose troubles are different from ours; we empathize with people in the same boat. "I feel your pain" is empathy, but "I can imagine your pain" is sympathy.*)

Which is the more noble and difficult feeling to have? Why? (*Sympathy is the nobler emotion because demands not only thoughtful reflection but a certain amount of serious reading. Some say sympathy is the more noble feeling because it requires actually experiencing the pain.*) Also: Who cares more? The person of sympathy or the person of empathy?

Verbs: sympathize empathize.

If we are all starving do we feel empathy or sympathy for each other?

When you see a poor person, do you feel sympathy or empathy?

If your friend’s parent dies. Do you feel sympathy or empathy? (*If this hasn’t happened to you, you feel sympathy. If it has happened to you, you feel empathy.*)

If you are suffering, what you do want from the other person: sympathy or empathy?

Does feeling sympathy mean being easy on a person or hard on a person? e.g. A student is sad about his poor marks.

Which is the more modern feeling? Empathy or Sympathy?

Do people in China feel much sympathy for each other?

Have you ever said “how are you?” to someone and not really cared?

How can we show we care for others? How can we show we care for them when they are suffering?

Do you remember a time when you felt you were misunderstood?

Do some people love to think of themselves as victims? (*Define victim*)

When you feel pain? Do you want understanding or do you want the pain to go away?

(*Jugdmentalism: bring this issue in.*)

Define Judge: Decide a person is good or bad (Guilty or Innocent)

Is it okay to judge others? (To be judgmental)

So if someone has trouble, would you tell them it is their fault. e.g. You got bad marks because you were lazy.

Can the sympathetic person judge?

Love and Marriage ESL discussion questions

Love

What is it?

What is true love?

Is Love more than like?

Is all love romantic?

What kinds of love are there? (e.g. Love of Children, Love of Money, Love of self,...)

What is the most important love?

Who or what is the love of your life?

What do you do to celebrate love?

How do you find love?

What do you have to do to be loved?

Is it better to love or be loved?

Is it better to have love and lost than to not have loved at all?

Does everyone deserve to be loved?

Who are the most famous lovers of all time?

Who had the greatest love for what?

Marriage

What are the married states?   Married, Divorced, Engaged, Widowed, Bachelor, single.

What is your preferred marriage state?  Is there anyone who doesn't want to be married.

Is marriage romantic or a practical arrangement?  

Do all Chinese single women always look for husbands?

Will you marry for money?  Will you marry for love?

Tell me what traits a good spouse should have?

What does a good husband have to do?

What does a good wife have to do?

What famous people do you want to marry?

What is polygamy?  

Do you want to have more than one spouse at one time?

Love and Marriage

Do Love and Marriage go together like a Horse and Carriage?  (sing song!)

Do you think old married people can be in love as much as newlyweds?

Are your parents in love?  Can you imagine them having been in love?

Who are the most romantic people you know?

Possessions Discussion Questions for ESL Classes

Possessions

What are they?  Things you have or own.  Your stuff.

What possessions do you have that are valuable, of sentimental value to you, necessary, luxury, obsolete, cutting-edge, antique, hand-me-down, worn-out, second hand, or should be discarded?

What possession is your most valued?

What possession are you most proud of?

What possession will you always keep?

What do you do with old possessions?  Where do you store them?  Is there a place you can go in your house like an attic or drawer and look at your old things.

What is the most interesting possession you have?

What is the oldest possession you have?

What possession have you had the longest?

Is the purpose of life to have as many possessions as possible?

Do you like having lots of stuff?

When can it be bad to have lots of stuff?   Can we be slaves to our things?

Do you try to sell or give away some of your possessions?

Do you like to lend things to other people?

Do you have something you borrowed from someone else that you forgot to return?

Have you ever given away something valuable because someone needed it?

Do you believe in the idea of private property?

What is more important to you:  possessions or experiences?

Show me a possession you have on you know that you are proud of or you think is interesting?

What stuff would you take with you if you had to move to another country?

You only have two minutes to take things out of house (perhaps because of a fire).  What would you take?