Busy Friends
- Sep 19, 2025
- 2 min read
Updated: Jul 2
This ESL Lesson Plan Busy Friends makes present continuous come alive through a simple, charming story about Amy and her very busy friends. On a Saturday afternoon, Amy tries to call each of her friends to go out — but everyone is doing something! From visiting family to painting, washing a car to playing basketball, students meet the grammar in a natural, memorable context before practising it themselves. With a fun miming game, sentence-building activities, picture tasks, a silly sentence game, and a short writing task, this lesson keeps young and beginner learners engaged from start to finish.
📄A1 ⏱️50 min 📁22 slides
Outcomes and skills:
Practiced speaking and listening by asking and answering “What are you doing?”.
Improved their reading skills by identifying Present Continuous forms in short texts.
Vocabulary
cooking
shopping
painting
calling
visiting
sleeping
washing
playing
studying
Lesson plan
Lead-in: Find Someone Who...
Students walk around the class and find classmates who are sitting on a chair, wearing white, drinking water, using a laptop, or speaking English — a natural and immediate introduction to present continuous in action.
Vocabulary: Action Verbs
Learners match nine action words to pictures: cooking, shopping, painting, calling, visiting, sleeping, washing, playing, and studying.
Act It Out: Miming Game
Students pick an action and act it out using only their body — no words! Classmates guess what they are doing, making vocabulary practice active and memorable.
Grammar: Present Continuous
A clear grammar table introduces the structure: subject + to be + verb-ing, with all pronouns covered and time expressions (now, at the moment) highlighted.
Reading: Busy Friends
Students read a short illustrated story about Amy, who calls each of her eight friends on a Saturday. Every friend is busy doing something different, giving students repeated, natural exposure to the present continuous.
Review: What Is Each Person Doing?
After reading, learners recall and write what each character (Jill, Alice, Maggy, Ben, John, Christo, Sam, and Jenny) is doing — a great memory and comprehension check.
Practice: Sentence Ordering
Students put eight sets of words in the correct order to make present continuous sentences, including positives, negatives, and questions.
Yes or No? Picture Task
Learners look at a picture and decide if four statements are true or false, explaining why the false sentences are wrong.
Speaking: True and False Sentences
Students make three true and three false sentences about a picture, then share with a partner who decides which is which.
Writing: Describe the Picture
Four guided questions (How many people? Where are they? What are they doing? What else can you see?) help students write a short paragraph in present continuous.
Game: Silly Sentences
Students combine a who, a doing what, a where, and a why to create funny, creative sentences — a playful and memorable way to close the lesson.
Additional Video