Unit 10 is a fascinating intermediate speaking unit all about world history, designed for all ages—including teens, adults, and mixed-age groups. Through short, readable texts, humorous dialogues, and structured speaking prompts, learners explore how humanity evolved from prehistory to the digital age.
This unit is perfect for:
ESL conversation classes
Content-based speaking lessons (CLIL)
Adult ESL programs
Mixed-age classrooms
Enrichment units on culture, civilization, and global issues
The unit is carefully designed so teachers can simply open a lesson and teach—no extra prep required.
Unit 10 explores human history from the very beginning of Earth to the modern digital world. Across four lessons, students learn to speak confidently about big events, understand global changes, and connect past to present.
Lessons cover:
Prehistory — Earth’s formation, early life, dinosaurs, mammals, early humans
Ancient Civilizations — Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, Indus Valley
Empires & the Middle Ages — Rome, Mongols, Ottomans, British Empire
Modern History — Industrial Revolution, World Wars, Space Age, Digital Era
Every lesson includes:
Warm-up speaking questions
Short reading passages
Clear vocabulary tasks
Speaking discussion prompts
Humorous dialogues to model natural English
Critical-thinking and “Would you rather?” activities
This unit helps students build content knowledge while practicing real, everyday English conversation.
Students practice explaining events, giving opinions, comparing civilizations, and expressing ideas about culture and progress.
Vocabulary includes:
emerge, adapt, dominant, represent, collapse, architecture
strategy, conflict, commerce, diverse, distant, united
cooperate, transform, progress, humanity, satellite, defeat
These words support both history content and general academic English.
Students discuss:
Human evolution
Empires rising and falling
How inventions changed society
How wars shaped world politics
How technology connects humanity
Dialogues mimic natural conversation, humor, tone, and rhythm—perfect for fluency practice.
Learners reflect on:
What makes a civilization successful
How cultures borrow ideas from one another
How history influences today
How future generations might see us
Explaining events
Sharing opinions
Comparing time periods
Agreeing/disagreeing respectfully
Telling stories & describing processes
Understanding short, natural dialogues
Recognizing tone, humor, and emphasis
Comprehending simplified historical texts
Extracting meaning from context
Cause & effect
Historical vocabulary
Connecting events across time
Evaluating progress
Reflecting on change
Discussing fairness, conflict & cooperation
Unit 10 uses a blend of:
Communicative Language Teaching
Content-Based Instruction (CLIL)
Task-Based Learning (ranking, comparing eras, historical debates)
Scaffolding (warm-ups → reading → guided questions → independent speaking)
Humor & storytelling to increase engagement
Differentiation for mixed skill levels
This unit is especially strong for adult learners and teens who enjoy big ideas, world events, and storytelling.
Although Unit 10 works beautifully as a stand-alone conversation module, it also fits smoothly into a full speaking curriculum.
It prepares students for:
Advanced Speaking Units (debates, global issues, ethics)
Academic prep units
CLIL social-studies units
Discussion courses on culture, society, or technology
It also connects naturally to Unit 9 (Food & Culture), Unit 11 (if applicable), and any unit focusing on civilization, time periods, or innovation.
Objective:
Explore Earth’s early formation, first life, dinosaurs, mammals, and the rise of early humans.
Key Vocabulary:
emerge, adapt, dominant, herbivore, settle, vanish
Activities Summary:
Readings on Earth’s formation, early oceans, first life, dinosaurs, Ice Age mammals, and early humans
Vocabulary tasks (e.g., adapt, vanish, dominant)
Humorous dialogues about asteroids, slime life, dinosaurs, and early humans
“Would you rather?” prehistoric scenarios
Benefits for Learners:
Builds essential background knowledge while giving students engaging, story-based speaking practice.
Objective:
Understand the world’s earliest civilizations and how writing, farming, trade, and government began.
Key Vocabulary:
irrigation, architecture, decipher, collapse, religion, enormous
Activities Summary:
Mesopotamia (writing, cities, irrigation)
Egypt (pharaohs, Nile, pyramids, hieroglyphics)
China (dynasties, inventions, philosophy, Great Wall)
Indus Valley (city planning, drains, mysterious writing)
Shared traits of civilizations
Vocabulary practice + dialogues
Benefits for Learners:
Great for CLIL—students practice explaining ideas, inventions, and historical mysteries.
Objective:
Explore how major empires grew through strategy, trade, culture, and conflict.
Key Vocabulary:
strategy, commerce, conflict, diverse, united, distant
Activities Summary:
Roman Empire (roads, laws, expansion)
Middle Ages (castles, knights, peasants, religion)
Mongol Empire (horses, Silk Road, cultural exchange)
Ottoman Empire (trade routes, diversity, art)
British Empire (colonies, language spread, problems)
Vocabulary + dialogues
Benefits for Learners:
Encourages deep reflection on leadership, fairness, cultural mixing, and global impact.
Objective:
Understand major global shifts from industrialization to the digital era.
Key Vocabulary:
transform, progress, satellite, humanity, defeat, cooperate
Activities Summary:
Industrial Revolution (machines, cities, factories)
World War I (trenches, new weapons, empires falling)
World War II (alliances, destruction, lessons in peace)
Space Age (moon landing, rockets, satellites)
Digital Era (internet, communication, technology challenges)
Dialogues + vocabulary
Benefits for Learners:
Perfect for discussions about technology, global cooperation, war and peace, and how life changes.
Encourage students to compare eras using sentence frames like:
“In the past… but today…”, “This changed life because…”
Use maps or images to build background knowledge.
Let students bring modern examples (YouTube, memes, inventions).
Turn dialogues into role-plays or group performances.
Connect historical patterns (migration, trade, innovation) to today’s world.
Allow multilingual learners to share stories from their home countries’ histories.
Use any of the following:
Mini-presentations: “The most important invention/era/empire”
Timeline discussions
“Which civilization would you live in?” debate
Vocabulary-based speaking tasks
Compare/contrast two time periods
Reflective writing on how modern life compares to ancient life