The TEFL Lab’s B1 Curriculum Structure

If you’re anything like us, you’re hyped to hear that the B1 curriculum is ready to go straight into the classroom with you (right after you’ve checked the teacher notes, of course)! But if you’ve already taught with our A1 and A2 level materials, you’ll notice some differences in the B1 content. Here’s the rundown:

B1 Modules have a specific structure.

We know that B1 is a beast of a level to conquer, so we’ve built in a bit more structure that gives B1 learners a ton of what they love– chances to speak– while also giving them slightly more focused experiences when it comes to listening and reading and the analysis skills we have to use with those skills.

That means that the first lesson of each module is designed to introduce learners to the module’s context and some of the target language. From there, lesson 2 picks up with a stronger focus on reading practice and comprehension. After that, lesson 3 follows up with a greater focus on listening comprehension skills. Finally, lesson 4 wraps up the module with a huge focus on speaking opportunities that bring together all of the knowledge from the previous lessons in the module. And as always, each module can be reviewed and with the module review, which allows you to assess learning, provide feedback to the learners, and bookend the module nicely before moving on.

Of course, the lessons in these modules contain speaking, reading, and listening opportunities in EVERY lesson. However, by designating a skill focus for each lesson, we’re able to give learners a bit more extensive practice in the same headspace that it takes to really focus and listen to media in their L2, or read and analyze text, or speak at length. That extra focus on one cognitive challenge at a time gives learners chances to identify, use, re-use, and perfect the strategies they need to be successful at different receptive and productive skills!

B1 lessons feature representative materials that mimic authentic materials.

Should you use authentic materials in class with learners of this level? Absolutely! And lucky for you, we’ve got a guide on just how to do it! But you’ll find some authentic material look-alikes in the B1 level lessons, too. Why is that?

Well, we took the best of both worlds and smushed them into engaging content that’s designed with your learners in mind. So all the language-grading and learner-focused design from representative materials meet the copy-writing, fluency features, and relevant-to-our-lives factors that make authentic materials so interesting. The result? You’ll have company newsletters, podcast episodes, company websites, blog posts, news reports, and more at your fingertips, ready to draw your learners into real-world applications of the target language at hand.

B1 lessons have an accompanying support material PDF available for every lesson.

We know that a huge focus at the B1 level is to grow a learner’s lexicon! They’ve finally got a grammar foundation that they can use as a frame to plug in new words and phrases, so you’ll see lots of new vocabulary and functional language in these lessons. Because of that, we’ve created a PDF that accompanies each lesson as a chance for learners to review the set of target language from that lesson, as well as practice their writing skills with some writing prompts that will elicit the use of that lesson’s target language.

All that said, there are plenty of things that you’ll notice are similar to the content in our A1 and A2 levels:

-Each lesson still features our easy-to-follow structure of setting an objective, completing a lesson, and then diving into the lesson. The lesson is wrapped up with a final speaking task and an exit ticket.
-Teacher notes are available in a pop-up on each slide AND in a downloadable PDF document.
-Target language is taught in contexts that make sense for professionals that need English to be successful at work.
-A blend of explicit instruction, implicit language in use, and dynamic drilling give learners a variety of ways to experiment with new target language, making it easier to address the needs of multiple learners in the same group.