ESL lesson plan | C1 | Do working moms have it harder?

Summary

This downloadable PDF lesson plan for English teachers explores work-life balance for mothers. A great ESL class material for advanced (C1) students, this lesson uses a video to compare social policies and spark discussion on cultural differences.

This C1 English lesson plan focuses on the challenges faced by working mothers, contrasting US and European social policies. Students watch a sociologist discuss her research, which leads to vocabulary exercises and grammar practice. Activities include a warm-up discussion, video comprehension questions, a gap-fill task, and a grammar exercise on contrast clauses. The lesson culminates in a structured debate, allowing students to use the new language to discuss differing cultural viewpoints on social support and personal responsibility.

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Activities

Activities include a warm-up discussion, video comprehension questions, a gap-fill task, and a grammar exercise on contrast clauses. The lesson culminates in a structured debate, allowing students to use the new language to discuss differing cultural viewpoints on social support and personal responsibility.
Students begin with a warm-up discussion, sharing their views on the challenges working parents face in their countries and the differences in pressure felt by men and women. This activates their prior knowledge and prepares them for the lesson's main topic.
Based on a video about a sociologist's research, students answer comprehension questions that contrast US and Swedish approaches to parental leave. This activity enhances listening skills and introduces key concepts like individualism versus collective responsibility.
The lesson ends with a structured debate on personal responsibility versus social support. Students analyze two opposing viewpoints and use the lesson's vocabulary and grammar to build arguments, fostering critical thinking and advanced conversational skills.

00:00 Work-family conflict is an issue that plagues mothers across Western industrialized countries, but it's easier in some places than others to be a working mom.

00:10 The United States is one of two countries on the planet that doesn't offer paid maternity leave. The United States and Papua New Guinea are the only two countries in the world that don't offer this benefit on a federal level.

00:25 I was interested in understanding what life was like day-to-day for women who live in other countries that have very different work-family policy supports, and also really different cultural attitudes when it comes to gender, and work, and caregiving.

00:38 Sweden is a country that has 480 days of paid parental leave for parents, and it's paid out at 80% wage replacement.

00:47 And I remember one mom telling me, I really think this should be 100% wage replacement. That is a very big dip in income. And from an American perspective, that's comical, because we have nothing.

00:56 We have no paid parental leave in our country.

01:02 Here in the US, women were really stressed and exhausted. And it was obvious on their faces. Oftentimes, they cried during our interviews. And they cried most often in response to one particular question.

01:14 I know that everybody has a different idea of what it means to be a good parent. But to you, what does it mean to be a good mother to your children?

01:24 And when women broke down in tears and explained to me, sometimes in the conference room in their office buildings, sometimes in their kitchens or their living rooms, that they felt they were failing their children. Their ideal for what it means to be a good mother felt very far away from their current state.

01:42 We live in a country that deeply values individualism. And, again, this idea of personal responsibility is central to the way our country is set up.

01:51 The US is one of only a few countries on the planet that has no federal standard for vacation and sick days, no paid parental leave, no universal social insurance entitlement, no universal health care, no universal child care.

02:05 We think of families and of caregiving as private and personal responsibilities.

02:10 Women tended to blame themselves when they struggled. When we live in a country that says it's your job to do this on your own, it's not at all surprising to me that mothers, when they experience difficulties, would say things to me like, well, yeah, if I just got a little more organized, or if I came up with a better schedule, or if I just prepared meals more on the weekends for my family.

02:28 Or maybe this spring break, when mothers said, we're not going to take a trip. We're going to stay at home and we're going to reorganize the house to make things a little less insane. They put it on themselves to resolve this.

02:37 And, again, you cannot fix a social problem with individual solutions. Being more organized or efficient does not bring about the sort of social change that all women both need and deserve here in the US.

02:50 In Germany, and Sweden, and Italy, and, of course, across many other Western wealthy countries, these are countries that have come to the collective consensus that caregiving is, again, a public responsibility, and the cost and burden of it should be shared across society.

03:05 Children themselves, as future workers, and taxpayers, and citizens, are a public good.

03:14 I think knowledgeable managers who don't act like this is the first time in the history of humankind that anyone has ever had to navigate having a kid and working at the same time can go a long way toward making working parents feel supported.

03:26 If I were a manager, I would think carefully about implementing policies like paid parental leave that are gender neutral.

03:34 And having a policy on the books is one thing, but encouraging employees to take them is very different. And often, that happens by managers leading the way.

03:44 And so managers can role model what it means to, for example, talk about your family day-to-day in the workplace, and not in ways that are stigmatized.

03:53 Managers can role model taking vacation days and sick days.

03:57 And, importantly, managers can also educate themselves about perhaps what policies are already on the books, but that folks don't often know about until they actually get pregnant and start trying to navigate how they're going to make this work for themselves.

04:12 We associate success with being fully committed 24 hours a day, seven days a week to work.

04:20 And it shifts the dialogue, the discourse when someone in a leading position shows that it can be done a different way that does not diminish their ability in the workplace.

04:27 If there are women listening here who are working moms themselves, the one message that I would want them to leave this with is the idea that their work-family conflict, and their stress, and their guilt, is not their fault. It is not their fault.

Vocabulary focus

The vocabulary centers on social policy and personal struggle. Students will learn and practice terms such as plague, wage replacement, entitlement, consensus, and individualism. The lesson also introduces useful phrases like blame themselves, a public good, and put it on themselves to help students discuss complex social issues with greater nuance and precision.

Grammar focus

The grammar point is clauses of concession and contrast. The lesson provides a clear explanation and examples of how to use connectors like despite, in spite of, although, even though, whereas, and however. Students then practice by rewriting sentences to correctly apply these structures, improving their ability to construct complex, well-reasoned arguments.

Do working moms have it harder?

Summary

Activities

Vocabulary focus

Grammar focus

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