That's English! - Module 8 - Unit 4: Shopping

This is a very common topic and it must be adapted to your own level, that is, to speak about shopping but with an accurate vocabulary and structures. But let's start with the general questions, as usual:

• Do you enjoy shopping? How often do you buy food/clothes/electronic devices? Do you prefer going alone or with someone else?
• Have you ever bought something you didn't wear later on? What happened? Did you give it away? How did you feel in the end?
• Do you ever buy second hand clothes? If so, where from? If not, give reasons. Have you ever given your clothes to a charitable organization? Why?
• What kind of shopper are you? Do you search a lot or do you buy the first thing you find?
• Do you ever buy on the Internet? Why/why not? What was the last thing you bought and what was your experience like?

Activity 1

On p.40 exercise 2 you read two people talking about buying in a local shop or in a supermarket. Discuss with your partner what kind of shop you prefer and give reasons. Try to see 3 advantages and 3 disadvantages of both places. What are your conclusions?

Activity 2

On p.42 exercise 7 you have some sentences about shopping habits. Having this in mind, ask your partner about their habits. Remember it's a conversation so make questions and answer them saying as many reasons as possible for your response.

Activity 3

On p. 47 you have a questionnaire about buying food. Comapare with your partner to see if you shop helathily and how you buy food. Try to use the vocabulary learnt in the previous page: 'used by' date, 'best before' date, 'display until', 'sell by', 'products have gone past the date on the labelling' and so on.

Activity 4

To practise with the order of adjectives, here you are some web pages:

• you can have an explanation about adjective order with two exercises at the end: click here
• this is another link with examples and an exercise: click here
• this is another link with explanation and an exercise
• have a look to these exercises: click here and here

Activity 5

Let's work with listening. We'll start with a simple one like this. This one is about the way of shopping but with strong accent. Then try this one with both exercises.
This is a listening comprehension about bargain shopping (a bit molre difficult): click here
Although this one is a bit difficult as well, it's about buying electronic gadgets: click here

This is another one about buying clothes.
If you want some more practice you have these exercises in elllo.org: click here

Although these exercises are quite easy they could be taken as models or samples of a typical conversation in a shop.