Possible Dangers Associated With Becoming a Millionaire Overnight

The following activity basically takes an old idea and exploits it from a different angle.

Level: Intermediate to advanced
Age: Adult

I split up the students into pairs and got them talking about millionaires or being millionaires.

I then got them to offer comments on the main title above, and here is what I got: (Do not show these to your pupils until they have made an effort)

• Avoiding friction with partner
• Leaving work
• Having too much free time
• Becoming arrogant
• Losing old friends
• Worrying more about what to do with the new-found wealth
• Being unaccustomed to luxuries
• Making foolish investments
• Being taken in by financial advisers
• Handling media interest
• Going to too many parties
• Having nothing to fight for
• Becoming more attractive to the opposite sex

The idea now, apart from debating any interesting comments ensuing from above, is to look for more new angles on old topics.

Some suggestions:

• Positive aspects of a rainy day.
• Negative aspects of a night out on the town.
• Positive aspects of school.
• Negative aspects of being a vegetarian.
• Positive aspects of watching TV.
• Negative aspects of doing sport.
• Positive aspects of being poor.
• Positive aspects of being in jail. (!)
• Negative aspects of being very beautiful.
• Etc.

Very often, what starts out as a brainstorming exercise can turn into a full-blown conversation.