Telling a Story: Culture

A fun lesson for beginner ESL students to learn vocabulary and expressions to have a conversation about Japanese culture. This is a great lesson to teach cultural awareness and compare cultures around the world. Watch the ESL video about Japanese culture and use the ESL Printable and Digital storytelling flashcards to retell the story and practice using new vocabulary and expressions. Get the downloadable worksheets, ESL printable and digital flashcards, ESL listening and reading exercises to talk about culture, and gamfify lesson with badges and stamps.

ESL Video and ESL Listening Practice Telling a Story about Culture

Watch the following video:

ESL Conversation about Culture using the Past Simple

Tony: It’s so quiet here without the kids.

Samantha: (Laugh) Yes, it sure is, isn’t it? So how was your business trip to Japan?

Tony: It couldn’t have been better. Japan is a very interesting country.

Samantha: Really? Please tell me all about it.

Tony: Well, first I went to Tokyo for meetings. After our meetings we all went for dinner at a traditional Japanese restaurant.  We ate a lot of interesting dishes such as oden and sushi and we drank lots of sake. After dinner, we went to karaoke. We sang for hours. It was a lot of fun. After karaoke, we went for ramen. Japanese ramen is really different from the ramen we buy here.

Samantha: How so?

Tony: Well, the noodles are homemade and there are many kinds of soup broth. I had ramen with pork and vegetables on top. It was so delicious.

Samantha: Wow, sounds like it.

Tony: Also, Japanese people make a really large slurping noise when eating ramen. I heard that it shows respect to the cook. The louder that you slurp, the more delicious that you think the noodles are.

Samantha: That’s really interesting. You often moan when you’re eating dinner. I guess it’s similar to that, right?

Tony: (Laugh) I guess so.

ESL Listening Questions – Conversation about Japanese Culture

1. How was Tony’s business trip to Japan?
2. What does Tony think of Japan?
3. Why did Tony go to Tokyo?
4. What did they do after their meetings?
5. What did they have at the restaurant?
6. What did they do after dinner?
7. How long were they are karaoke for?
8. What did they do after karaoke?
9. How does Tony describe the ramen?
10. What did Tony have on top of his ramen?
11. What do Japanese people do when eating their ramen?
12. According to Tony, why do Japanese people slurp their ramen?

ESL Printable and Digital Flashcards

Use the flashcards to talk about Japanese culture.

Matching – ESL Talking about Culture Vocabulary Builder

Match the words on the left with the meanings on the right.

ESL Gamification: Digital Badges and Stamps

Gamify your lessons and reward your students with digital badges and stamps.

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Reference: I1L6