Learning English through nature

This material is aimed firstly at naturalists who want to improve their English. It may also be of interest to advanced students of English, and to teachers using CLIL with schoolchildren. It is designed with students in Spain in mind, but almost all of the animals are present in the rest of Europe and Britain and so should be of use to EFL students from elsewhere.

Animals and natural history form one of the inspirations for all languages and English is no exception. Therefore, advanced students of English need to have a good grounding in such vocabulary to be able to understand many expressions, and cultural and literary references.

In 2009 I will be offering two courses in the Barcelona area on English and natural history.

  1. Escola oficial de idiomes. 40 hour course on “Enjoying nature in English”. 10 two hour lectures and 5 four-hour walks. Details here from EOI website

  2. Course for Extra Credits with the University of Barcelona. English for naturalists. Practical course on Collserola. More here

  3. Togther with Sergi Garcia of Galanthus. I also run eight-day trips to the Isle of Mull, Scotland, for Spanish people, based on natural history and English. More here

  4. Regular walks in Barcelona’s parks for people interested in nature and who want to improve their English. More here

You are free to print out and use these exercises in the classroom but not of course to publish them. If you do use them and have time, please let me know how they went and what you think. Thanks.

Nature vocabulary exercises and activities
Learning English through nature - home