Lesson: How to make the most of your weekend

Conversation

Answer the following questions. You might be asked to write them down or answer them out-loud.

What do you usually do during the week?
What do you usually do during the weekend?
Do you sometimes feel like work stops you from relaxing on the weekend?
What's the biggest problem you have had at work? How did you solve it?
Do you find it hard to balance your personal life and work?
What do you do to relax and disconnect from work?
Do you check your work related emails on the weekend?
Do you like your job?
If you could change one thing about your work, what would it be?
When was the last time you had fun for real? What did you do?

Vocabulary

Look at the vocabulary below. Take time to explore the links for their definitions in English and their translations to portuguese. When you are done, make a sentence with each word. Ask your teacher if you should write them down or say them out loud.

[d] [t] - seal
[d] [t] - mode
[d] [t] - key
[d] [t] - bare
[d] [t] - while
[d] [t] - hiking
[d] [t] - focus

Video

Watch the following video but DON'T read the transcript yet.

After watching the video do this listening exercise.

Transcript:

You've worked hard all week; meetings, presentations, emails - more emails. And it's finally the weekend.

Here's the trouble. We spend all week learning how to be productive. So, it's hard to break the seal when Friday comes. You can try to avoid work, but you're still in work mode.

See, the key to having a real break during the weekend is to do things that are not productive. So while turning off the phone is good, creating something with your bare hands is better. And while turning off the email may be helpful, taking your family on a hiking trip to a state park will actually help you disconnect.

So do something this weekend that makes you focus on being unproductive and it might just feel like a weekend again.

Writing practice

Write a couple of paragraphs describing what a perfect weekend would look like in your opinion. Make sure to use words you learned from the text and try to make it as long as you can. This is your opportunity to show off your writing skills.