Black Friday during COVID-19: lesson ideas

Snaking lines at midnight and customers storming retail stores are synonymous with Black Friday, but that was before COVID-19 and mandatory social distancing. The biggest event of the retail calendar will be different in 2020 as bargain hunters need to avoid crowds to minimise their risk of being infected. This year the lessons devoted to Black Friday will also be different. We have prepared some tasks suitable for Intermediate+ students. 

Task 1 — Warm-up

Start the lesson with a discussion of students’ shopping experience. 

Discuss the questions:

• Do you enjoy shopping?
• Have you ever spent too much money on anything?
• What is the most expensive thing you have ever bought?
• Are you a bargain hunter?
• What’s Black Friday? When is it and what happens?

If you have enough time, you can talk a little bit more about Black Friday. Use this lesson plan and these activities. 

Task 2 — Lead-on

Look at the CCTV footage typical for Black Friday. What’s wrong with it?

Key: 

The footage is supposed to be taken on November 27. However, during quarantine, there will be no such crowds due to the social distancing requirement. 

Task 3 — Black Friday 2020

Now it’s time to discuss shopping during quarantine.

Discuss the questions: 

• Will COVID-19 make Black Friday a thing of the past?  
• Can Black Friday survive social distancing?
• What should retailers do to reduce crowds in their stores during a pandemic?
• What should retailers do to make people purchase online more? 

Read the text and check your guesses:

With the coronavirus spreading, local businesses and national retailers can’t risk attracting the crowds that normally show up — often camping outside and waiting in line for hours — for deep discounts and special promotions. So, yes, holiday shopping is just one more thing the coronavirus pandemic has turned upside down in 2020.

But it isn’t all bad news for deal hunters.

Retailers are doing their best to safely draw in customers during the 2020 holiday shopping season by expanding the length of time to cash in on online doorbuster deals and offering curbside pickup and delivery. Local businesses also are offering innovative shopping promotions, including pre-booked shopping times and free gifts. 

Since we’re still in the midst of the pandemic, national and local retailers have adopted alternative strategies for holiday shopping during the coronavirus to keep both shoppers and employees safe.

First, they are emphasizing their online options, including curbside delivery. Second, and perhaps more important, they are extending their Black Friday sales earlier into the year. In fact, the holiday shopping creep got started before Halloween. Many stores started their holiday deals in October. Amazon, which usually holds its annual Prime Day sales event in mid-July, delayed it to the middle of October. The nation’s largest retailer Walmart says it will spread out its traditional one-day Black Friday deals over three weekends in November in an effort to reduce crowds in its stores during a pandemic. Also, more of its doorbuster deals will be reserved for online, as a way to steer more shoppers away from its stores. Macy’s announced it will begin Black Friday sales immediately after Halloween. Target’s Black Friday deals will be online and in stores for the entire month of November, and it will offer “weeklong discounts and digital deals every day” starting Nov. 1. Home improvement chain Home Depot will stretch its Black Friday deals over nearly two months — starting in November and running through December.

Several major retailers have already changed their Black Friday plans to adjust to the ‘new normal.’ Target, Best Buy, Walmart, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Macy’s will all be closed Thanksgiving Day, and most stores will face capacity constraints that will put an end to the long lines and big crowds the following day. We’ll still find steep discounts the day after Thanksgiving,” said Sara Skirboll, a retail and shopping expert with RetailMeNot. “But for 2020, Black Friday is not the official kick-off to the holiday shopping season. It’s already underway and so are the deals.”

Even with all of the unique ways retailers are hoping to safely bring people in the doors, Horwitz says the upcoming holiday shopping season promises to be the most unusual one ever, as both retailers and their customers adjust to life amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

(The text is adapted from usnews.com and wbrz.com) 

Alternatively, you can watch this video and ask students to note down how COVID-19 will affect Black Friday.

Task 4 — Online shopping vocabulary 

Ask students about their online shopping experience. 

Discuss the questions:

• Why is online shopping so popular these days?
• Do you think that online shopping will replace retail stores in the future?
• What risks would take when shopping online? Why?
• What are the advantages and disadvantages of online shopping?

Then ask to visit any shopping website in English and note down any words they think are connected to online shopping (e.g. basket, order, deals, checkout, delivery, payment). Ask them to add the word they find into a word cloud (create it in advance using AnswerGarden). 

Hand out the vocabulary list below and ask to compare with their word cloud. 

Online shopping vocabulary: 

• create an account 
• remove the item from your basket
• proceed to Checkout
• place an order
• in stock 
• enter the payment details
• shipping address
• add to basket
• add to wishlist
• delivery
• track your package
• cash on delivery
• shipping rates
• postage and packing 

Then students fill in the blanks with the words above. 

 Task 5 — Online Black Friday 

Next step is the personalize all the studied material. 

Discuss the questions:

1) Are you a Black Friday shopper? Why or why not?

If yes:

• What have you bought during Black Friday?
• Have you ever bought online during Black Friday?
• Do you get excited about sales and discounts? 
• Are you planning to buy something Black Friday this year?
• How to make the most of Black Friday deals? (Find ideas here).

If no:

• Do you think that the Black Friday is pure consumerism?
• Do you think that kicking off Black Friday sales early can prevent crowds in shops? 
• What do you think about Black Friday deals? Are they really that good?

2) Check out the latest deals from Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart here and choose what you’d buy. Explain your choice. For more stores and deals visit this website. 

Task 6 — Black Friday marketing ideas

Ask students to look at adverts and guess how they are designed to drive more traffic and sales during the biggest shopping season of the year. The answers are here. 

Task 7 — Online shopping vs traditional shopping. 

Wind up your lesson with debates or essays on the topic “Online shopping vs traditional shopping” (use this great worksheet). 

Homework 

Create a video ad for deals in your city. Use these templates. 

Hope these lesson ideas will help you to have a great shopping lesson.

Speaking activities are, obviously, essential for English language speaking classes. A lot of students join classes particularly to develop their communicative competence, become more fluent, versatile, adaptable, and confident communicators in English. However, designing speaking activities might be time-consuming and nerve-wracking for any teacher. We have prepared a memo with superb ready-made speaking tasks that will make your student talking. Download it here.