A selection of English ESL reform printables

This lesson is based on five-minute  playmobil dramatization of the events of the Reformation. A good introduction to the topic. Student worksheet included. Main focus is on improving listening skills.

Reformation

This worksheet explores the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire and its impact on safety reforms, and is designed for A2–B1 level English learners. It features a 600-word reading passage that details the tragic event, the working conditions of the time, and the subsequent changes in workplace safety regulations. The resource includes warm-up questions to activate prior knowledge, a vocabulary matching activity with a two-column format, fill-in-the-blank sentences, true/false and multiple-choice questions, as well as short-answer and discussion prompts. Overall, it aims to enhance reading comprehension, expand safety-related vocabulary, and foster thoughtful classroom discussions.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire and Its Impact on Safety Reforms

This worksheet incorporates both writing and speaking practice. Students have write their own celebrity interview and preform it in front of the class. It is a fun activity that encourages students to be creative.  

Celebrity Interview

This document offers students different strategies to guess words from context clues and allows them to practice decoding and reforming them. There is an answer key for the first activity.

How to Guess Words from Context

40 Sentence Patterns will be very helpful to make drilling in the classroom. Learners will develop the ability of practicing 40 types of sentences. Each sentence can be reformed the instructor for the benefit of the learners.

40 Sentence Patters

Third Conditional Discovery Task. I created this task in order to try and help  students think about the grammar point rather than the teacher just giving them the answer, students should discuss the questions about the various sentences then create their own timeline. They will also need to analyse 1st and 2nd conditionals and answer the concept questions. There are also sentences for them to transform into the 2nd and 3rd conditional sentences can become confusing when compared with the 2nd conditional as the reference of time changes. So, it is important to help students understand and try to internalise the meaning of the 3rd conditional. Asking them to create their own timeline is a way for you as the teacher to monitor if they are actually understanding the reference of time. The answers have been provided. The sentence reformulation just helps to add some more consolidation for the students. I hope  you will find this worksheet useful and it makes it easier for to teach this grammar point.

Third Conditional Discovery Task

This worksheet is designed for A2–B1 level English learners and focuses on the evolution of workplace safety. It includes a 700-word reading passage that explores safety protocols from the past, present, and future, highlighting key developments such as labor reforms, modern regulations, and technological advancements like AI and IoT safety monitoring. The worksheet features a variety of activities, including warm-up questions, vocabulary matching, fill-in-the-blank exercises, true/false and multiple-choice questions, short-answer responses, and discussion prompts. This resource helps students improve reading comprehension, expand safety-related vocabulary, and develop critical thinking skills through structured activities.

The Evolution of Safety Protocols

This B1-level worksheet explores the topic of whether schools are truly preparing students for the real world. It includes a thought-provoking reading text, vocabulary matching, comprehension questions, and discussion prompts focused on school rules, life skills, and educational reform. The grammar focus is on the Past Perfect Continuous, with a sidebar explanation and a full practice section on the final page, including controlled exercises and speaking tasks. Ideal for adult learners or teens in upper-intermediate classes who enjoy opinion-based topics.

What Your Child’s School Gets Wrong : past perfect continuous

NO PRINTING REQUIRED. This short classroom activity introduces reported speech in a simple, memorable, and low-stress way by using humor and spoken interaction. It is designed as a quick warm-up or lead-in and works especially well with teenage or adult learners who struggle with abstract grammar explanations. The focus is on meaning first: students hear or read a short, funny sentence in direct speech and then retell it later using reported speech. The teacher gives one student a slip of paper with a sentence on it, the student reads it silently, and the class is asked to report what was said. Students usually produce a mix of correct and partially correct answers, which creates a natural opportunity for reformulation on the board without interrupting fluency. The teacher then writes the correct reported version on the board and briefly checks understanding by asking whether the words are exact or part of a story told later. If students ask why forms like “had been” appear, the explanation stays meaning-based and accessible, focusing on the idea of states versus actions rather than grammar terminology. The activity requires only a whiteboard or blackboard, making it ideal for low-prep lessons, substitute teachers, or classrooms with limited resources. It can be repeated with different sentences, easily adapted to suit different age groups or school cultures, and reused throughout the year as a natural way to introduce or revisit reported speech.

Teaching Reported Speech with Humor

Culture, intercultural communication, cross-cultural communication

Adjectives to describe feelings, emotions

Adjectives to describe personality and character

Adjectives: Gradable / Non-gradable adjectives

Articles: Definite or indefinite article (a, an or the)

BE + infinitive structures (e.g. he was to become famous)

Clauses of contrast (e.g.  although, while)

Clauses of purpose (e.g. in order to, so that, so as to)

Clauses of reason (e.g. because, because of, due to, as, since)

Cleft sentences (e.g. It's Joey we're looking for)

Comparison: Comparative adjectives and structures

Comparison: Superlative adjectives and structures

Conditional 2 (second conditional) - would

Conditionals: Conditional phrases (e.g. unless, provided that, as long as)

Conjunctions (aka connectives, e.g. and, but, or, so, then)

Contractions (shortened forms, e.g. don't, aren't, etc.)

Determiners (words that can come before nouns)

Formal and informal English (politeness or colloquial language)

Future perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Future perfect simple and continuous (progressive) tense

Future phrases (e.g. be about to, bound to, likely to, due to, set to + INF)

Homonyms (two words with the same pronunciation - homophones and homographs)

It as preparatory subject (e.g. it's raining, it's nice of you to)

Linking verbs (aka copulas, e.g. I am a student)

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how to accuse somebody of something in English

how to apologize, say sorry, forgive and express regret in English

how to ask for information and make inquiries in English

how to ask for something, make requests in English

how to blame somebody for something in English

how to defend yourself from criticism in English

how to deny or admit something in English

how to describe things or people in English

how to emphasize important things in English

how to encourage or discourage people in English

how to evaluate people or progress in English

how to express agreement /disagreement in English

how to express approval and disapproval  in English

how to express cause and effect in English

how to express interest in something in English

how to express likelihood, probability in English

how to express likes and dislikes in English

how to express sequence and chronology in English

how to express shock and disbelief in English

how to express sympathy and condolences in English

how to give permission, authorization in English

how to inform somebody about some news in English

how to interpret what was said in English

how to keep a conversation going in English

how to make guesses about something in English

how to make, accept and refuse offers in English

how to order or make a booking in English

how to persuade, convince people in English

how to praise people and express appreciation in English

how to reassure somebody of something in English

how to refuse and object to something in English

how to remind people of something in English

how to rephrase, paraphrase what was said in English

how to say thank you, express gratitude in English

Nouns: Collective nouns (team, class, family, committee)

Nouns: Proper nouns (names of people, cities, companies)

Oxymorons (phrases with words of contradictory meaning, e.g. living dead)

Participles: Past participle (e.g. HAVING DONE)

Participles: Present participle (e.g. DOING)

Parts of Speech (aka word classes, e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs)

Past perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Phonetics (pronunciation, IPA, phonetic symbols)

Plural nouns: regular plurals with S ending

Prefixes (e.g. A, UN, IM, DIS, MIS, EN, etc. )

Prepositions vs adverbs (e.g. before me, saw him before.)

Prepositions: Double prepositions (e.g. out of)

Prepositions: Participle prepositions (e.g. pending, concerning)

Prepositions: Phrase prepositions (e.g. by means of)

Present perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Present perfect simple or present continuous tense

Present simple tense: S for third person singular verbs

Present simple vs continuous (progressive) tense

Pronouns: EACH OTHER, ONE ANOTHER (reciprocal pronouns)

Pronouns: Possessive pronouns (e.g. my, mine)

Pronouns: Reflexive pronouns (e.g. myself, yourself))

Pronouns: SOMEBODY, ANYBODY, EVERYBODY, NO ONE, NOTHING, etc.

Pronouns: THIS, THAT, THESE, THOSE (demonstratives)

Pronouns: YOU and THEY to talk about people in general

Quantifiers (e.g. some, many, much, any, few, little)

Questions: WH questions (open-ended questions)

Reported speech: reported questions (indirect questions)

There is / there are / there was / there were / there will be, etc.

Verbs: Transitive or intransitive verbs (words that can or cannot stand with objects)

Working with Paragraphs: ordering, titling

Role play, miming, drama activity or improv game

Pictionary (picture dictionary) or picture matching

Writing an opinion essay (persuasive essay)

Learners who are Pre-A1 have just begun learning English and will first learn how to:<ul><li>Say the letters in the alphabet and numbers</li><li>Say hello, talk about names and age</li><li>Name the colors and dates, express likes and dislikes</li></ul>

Absolute beginners who have begun to learn the letters and numbers

Learners taking the A1 Elementary exam should be able to:<ul><li>Introduce themselves and ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, things he/she has, people he/she knows.</li><li>Communicate using very basic phrases as long as the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: common adjectives & adverbs of frequency, going to, how much/how many, imperatives, I'd like, 's – possessive, common prepositions of place and time, present simple & continuous, there is/are</li></ul>

A very basic tourist level, which is enough for buying food and a bus ticket

Learners taking the A2 Pre-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand sentences and frequently used expressions (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment).</li><li>Complete tasks that are routine and exchange information about familiar matters.</li><li>Describe matters of immediate need in simple terms.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: countable/uncountable nouns, adverbs of frequency, future will/going to, much/many, present perfect, past simple, past continuous, common phrasal verbs, common modals: can/should</li></ul>

A tourist who can do basic conversations about the past, present and future

Learners taking the B1 Intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand points regarding family, work, school or leisure-related topics.</li><li>Deal with most travel situations in areas where the language is spoken.</li><li>Create simple texts on topics of personal interest.</li><li>Describe experiences, events, dreams, and ambitions, as well as opinions or plans in brief.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: question tags, intensifiers: too/enough, future tenses, past tenses, modals, conditionals, wh-questions in the past</li></ul>

Learners who can deal with both familiar and routine situations, in friendly and work contexts

Learners taking the B2 Upper-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialization.</li><li>Interact with fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without difficulty for either party.</li><li>Produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain an opinion on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: perfect tenses, mixed conditionals, modals in the present, phrasal verbs, reported speech, wish, relative clauses</li></ul>

The level where you can be a tour guide for your foreign friends and talk about a lot of topics, even abstract ones, with ease and fluency

Learners taking the C1 Advanced exam should be able to: Express ideas fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions. Use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes. Understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts. Produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, using linking phrases (=words that connect ideas between sentences). Main grammar points to know: inversion, mixed conditionals, modals in the past, all passive forms, phrasal verbs (all patterns), wish/if only for regrets

Learners who can smoothly communicate in every walk of life, read long texts and write well

Learners taking the C2 Proficient exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand almost everything read or heard with ease.</li><li>Summarize information from a variety of sources into a coherent presentation.</li><li>Express themselves using precise meaning in complex scenarios.</li><li>Can express him/herself spontaneously, very fluently and precisely, differentiating finer shades of meaning even in the most complex situations</li></ul>

Get here and you are ready to study in English at university

9 Reform English ESL worksheets pdf & doc