During the summer of 2018, students in my IELTS 2 class were asked to read articles on topics in the English language news and recommend ones that they found interesting to other students for class discussion.
The results of that homework informed us that US politics and the environment are the most popular choices so we will start with one of them.
In this first online lesson, we will choose the topic of President Donald Trump. We read and discussed two articles in class. The aim was to generate ideas and develop an awareness of the appropriate language for discussing the issues raised. The two articles are:
- Trump’s trade war with China and Europe will hit global growth
- The Trump Economy, One Year In: A Success By All Measures (this article has lots of links to other positive articles about Trumponomics if you scroll down to its end)
You will need to read these two articles carefully to complete the task.
Task:
Using the comments boxes below, discuss the following questions:
- Why do some people think that countries should focus on international cooperation in economics and politics?
- Why do some people think that countries should create barriers to trade in order to protect their own economies?
- Which position do you think is best? Why?
You can either simply write your own response to the question or (better) you can reply to the other students’ responses (e.g. do you agree or disagree with them? Why? Is the students’ logic clear or does it need more explanation? Can you think of examples to develop the ideas that are expressed?).