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Texas Adult Education Standards and Benchmarks
for ABE ASE and ESL Learners

esl LESSON PLANS

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Texas Adult Education Standards
Lesson Plan

Before you begin

Title: Writing a Thank You Letter

Setting: ESL

NRS Level(s): Level 5: High Intermediate

Open entry/exit: Yes

Context: Community

Standard(s): ESLConvey Ideas in Writing

Benchmark(s): 1.5, 2.5, 3.5, 4.5

Objective: To create written communication that conveys a message of gratitude.

Materials: Chalkboard, chalk, pencil, paper

Estimated time needed to prepare for this lesson plan: 30 minutes

Estimated time needed to complete this lesson plan: 2 hours

The Lesson Plan

Introduce the lesson:
Review the basic parts of a letter with the whole class. Discuss the significance of the history and meaning of an American holiday (e.g. Thanksgiving). Discussion should center around expressing and giving thanks.

Teach the lesson:
As a class, identify a person to whom the students all share a sense of gratitude and plan thank you letters to be sent to this person. Students will be instructed on how to outline the body of the letter with an introductory paragraph, a paragraph expressing the reasons they wish to thank this person, and a closing paragraph that conveys a sense of good will.

Practice the lesson:
As a class, students will participate in brainstorming ideas. One student might be assigned to write the results of the brainstorming on the chalkboard or allow someone to volunteer. Students will use the ideas from the brainstorming session to construct individual thank you letters. The teacher should observe each student to make sure students are applying proper letter-writing format, to make sure their ideas are organized in distinct paragraphs, and offer advice about grammar, spelling and vocabulary.

Assess the lesson:
Instructor feedback is given individually at various stages of the letter writing process.

Apply the lesson to the real world:
Students can apply this lesson to any real-world situation where expressing gratitude in writing is appropriate (e.g. birthday gifts, Christmas gifts, etc).

Submitted by: Judy Dean

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