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GENERAL ENGLISH · ENGLISH IN VIDEO · UPPER-INTERMEDIATE (B2-C1)

HOW TO STAY
CALM UNDER
PRESSURE
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1 Warm up
With your partner, talk about the questions below.

1. In what situations do you feel under pressure?

2. How well do you cope in stressful situations?
3. Do you think that stress is just a side effect of modern life?
4. Do you think that some people are affected by pressure more than others?
5. What kind of things do you do to help yourself feel calm?

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HOW TO STAY CALM UNDER PRESSURE

2 Focus on vocabulary

Part A: Add the following extracts to the gaps in the definitions.

a lot of praise good quality important part know exactly

less effective stress and pressure unpleasant memory very strongly

1. choking (v) - unable to perform to your known standard due to high levels of

2. haunts (v) - an or thought from your past that continues to return to your mind

3. undermine (v) - to make something , often related to confidence

4. boils down to (phr. verb/ idiom) - to focus on a fundamental/ the most of something

5. primed (v) - to be prepared and what you should do

6. acutely (adv.) - to feel or notice something

7. extol (v) - to give to something

8. virtues (n) - a specific or habit

Part B: Now complete the sentences with appropriate words from Part A.

1. My friend was always going on about the of being a dog owner, but I was still
happy to live on my own.

2. She was aware of the fact that she was likely to lose her job, the company had
been losing money for months.

3. I had to give a presentation to my classmates, and despite all my preparation I was sure I was going
to .

4. The important thing to remember about football is that it all which team scores
the most goals.

5. Jessica was still by the time she dropped her chocolate milkshake on her father
in law’s brand-new shoes.

6. My boss continually tried to me by pointing out that he went to Oxford and I

didn’t.

7. People often love hiking as it can the benefits of freedom and a love of the great
outdoors.

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HOW TO STAY CALM UNDER PRESSURE

Part C: Personalise the vocabulary: share your opinions with your classmates using the questions
below.

1. What do you think the success of a good language learner boils down to?
2. How would you react if someone in your workplace tried to undermine you?
3. Is there anything from your childhood that still haunts you a little bit?
4. Are you acutely aware of any serious issues occurring in your country at the moment?
5. Have you ever seen or been aware of a sportsperson, or a performer choking?

3 Understanding the main idea

Listen to the first section of the TED talk by Noa Kageyama and Pen-Pen Chen on ‘’How to stay calm
under pressure" (0:00-0:53), then decide if the following statements are true (T) or false (F). If the
statements are false, then change them to true.

1. Choking happens when an athlete makes their shot.

2. Choking happens a lot in sports.

3. Choking only occurs with sportspeople and athletes.

4. The majority of people say it happens because they are naturally nervous.

Glossary:
Spelling bee - a competition where contestants must spell increasingly difficult words
Darts players - participants who throw small arrow-shaped missiles at a circular target to score points

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4 Listening comprehension

Listen to the rest of the video (00:54-04:28) and select the correct answer for the following questions.

1. The speaker suggests that performance is harmed when the mind is preoccupied with:

a. worries, doubts or anxiety

b. worries, doubts or nervousness

c. worries, doubts or fears

d. worries, doubts or tears

2. A 2004 maths study found students who were stressed performed:

a. worse on more difficult, memory-intensive tasks

b. better on more difficult, memory-intensive tasks

c. worse on easy maths problems

d. worse on both easy and difficult maths problems

3. Tasks done ________ are most vulnerable to a certain type of choking:

a. subconsciously

b. consciously

c. unconsciously

d. all of the above

4. Two things that can help us avoid choking at the most important times are to:

a. eliminate stress and high-pressure routines

b. practise under stressful conditions and have a pre-performance routine

c. have a healthy diet and a good sleeping routine

d. practise under stressful conditions and have a post-performance routine

5. According to the research, this is more effective and works better than an internal focus on the
ultimate goal:
a. imaginary focus

b. emotional focus

c. no goal at all

d. external goal

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6. Fill in the gaps to form the conclusion of the video: "practice, _______ , ________ , ___________,
makes perfect":
a. under pressure, with focus and with that fire burning inside

b. under pressure, with focus, and with the glorious end goal in sight

c. under pressure, with focus, and with the internal ember burning bright

d. under pressure, with focus, and without being uptight

5 Adjectives

The following adjectives are all taken from the video you just watched. Match them to the correct
definition.

1. preoccupied a. a thing that you cannot stop or prevent

2. vulnerable b. thinking about one thing so much that you can’t focus on
anything else
3. explicit c. something that is incredibly easy to understand, crystal clear

4. inevitable d. be easily influenced or affected by something

5. susceptible e. somebody or something that can be damaged easily, both

physically and emotionally

Now, use the adjectives to fill in the gaps in the statements and discuss with your partner if you agree
or disagree.

1. Governments should do more to help people in society.

2. Teenage boys are more to the influence of their peers.

3. Climate change is and there is nothing that can be done.

4. People are too with staring at their phones instead of doing something worthwhile.

5. Language teachers should always give instructions if they want their students to
improve quickly.

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6 Talking point

In pairs discuss the following questions on the themes brought up in today’s lesson:

1. What was the most surprising thing that you heard in today’s video?
2. Why do you think some people are more susceptible to choking than others?
3. Do you think having an external focus instead of an internal focus is good for performance? Could
you integrate this strategy into your life?
4. What is more important for an athlete: physical performance or mental performance? What about
a singer?
5. Which statement do you think is more realistic?

• Practice makes perfect.

• Practice, under pressure, with focus, and with that glorious end goal in sight, makes perfect.

7 Speaking - roleplay

Professional sportspeople often employ coaches to improve their psychological performance for big
sport events. Work with a partner and act out a roleplay between:

Using the ideas and vocabulary from today’s lesson, come up with and practise your dialogue. Once
you feel confident enough your teacher will ask you to perform your dialogue for another pair in you
class.

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HOW TO STAY CALM UNDER PRESSURE

Transcripts

3. Understanding the main idea

Speaker: Your favourite athlete closes in for a victorious win. The crowd holds its breath, and, at the
crucial moment, she misses the shot. That competitor just experienced the phenomenon
known as "choking," where despite months, even years, of practice, a person fails right
when it matters most.

Speaker: Choking is common in sports, where performance often occurs under intense pressure
and depends on key moments. And yet, performance anxiety also haunts public speakers,
contestants in *spelling bees, and even world-famous musicians.

Speaker: Most people intuitively blame it on their nerves, but why does being nervous undermine
expert performance? There are two sets of theories, which both say that primarily, choking
under pressure boils down to focus.

Speaker: First, there are the distraction theories. These suggest that performance suffers when the
mind is preoccupied with worries, doubts, or fears, instead of focusing its attention on
performing the task at hand.

Speaker: When relevant and irrelevant thoughts compete for the same attention, something has to
give. The brain can only process so much information at once. Tasks that challenge working
memory, the mental “scratch pad” we use to temporarily store phone numbers and grocery
lists, are especially vulnerable to pressure.

Speaker: In a 2004 study, a group of university students were asked to perform math problems,
some easy, others more complex and memory intensive. Half the students completed both
problem types with nothing at stake, while the others completed them when calm and
under pressure. While everyone did well on the easy problems, those who were stressed
performed worse on the more difficult, memory-intensive tasks.

Speaker: Explicit monitoring theories make up the second group of explanations for choking under
pressure. They’re concerned with how pressure can cause people to overanalyse the task
at hand. Here, the logic goes that once a skill becomes automatic, thinking about its precise
mechanics interferes with your ability to do it. Tasks we do unconsciously seem to be most
vulnerable to this kind of choking.

Speaker: A study on competitive golfers compared their performance when instructed to simply
focus on putting as accurately as possible, versus when they were primed to be acutely
aware of the mechanics of their putting stroke. Golfers usually perform this action
subconsciously, so those who suddenly tuned in to the precise details of their own moves
also became worse at making accurate shots.

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Speaker: Choking may not be inevitable for everyone though. Research suggests that some are
more susceptible than others, especially those who are self-conscious, anxious, and afraid
of being judged negatively by others.

Speaker: So, how can we avoid choking when it really counts? First, it helps to practice under
stressful conditions. In a study on expert *dart players, researchers found that those who
hadn’t practiced under stress performed worse when anxious, compared to those who
had become accustomed to pressure. Secondly, many performers extol the virtues of a
pre-performance routine, whether it’s taking a few deep breaths, repeating a cue word, or
doing a rhythmic sequence of movements.

Speaker: Studies on golfing, bowling, and water polo find that short rituals can lead to more
consistent and accurate performance under pressure. And thirdly, researchers have shown
that having an external focus on the ultimate goal works better than an internal focus,
where someone is tuned into the mechanics of what they’re doing.

Speaker: A study of experienced golfers revealed that those who hit chip shots while focused on the
flight of the ball performed significantly better than those who focused on the motion of
their arms. So, perhaps we can modify that age-old saying: practice, under pressure, with
focus, and with that glorious end goal in sight, makes perfect.

4. Listening comprehension

Speaker: Your favourite athlete closes in for a victorious win. The crowd holds its breath, and, at the
crucial moment, she misses the shot. That competitor just experienced the phenomenon
known as "choking," where despite months, even years, of practice, a person fails right
when it matters most.

Speaker: Choking is common in sports, where performance often occurs under intense pressure
and depends on key moments. And yet, performance anxiety also haunts public speakers,
contestants in *spelling bees, and even world-famous musicians.

Speaker: Most people intuitively blame it on their nerves, but why does being nervous undermine
expert performance? There are two sets of theories, which both say that primarily, choking
under pressure boils down to focus.

Speaker: First, there are the distraction theories. These suggest that performance suffers when the
mind is preoccupied with worries, doubts, or fears, instead of focusing its attention on
performing the task at hand.

Speaker: When relevant and irrelevant thoughts compete for the same attention, something has to
give. The brain can only process so much information at once. Tasks that challenge working
memory, the mental “scratch pad” we use to temporarily store phone numbers and grocery
lists, are especially vulnerable to pressure.

FOOOOTERAPPENDIXLEFT
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HOW TO STAY CALM UNDER PRESSURE

Speaker: In a 2004 study, a group of university students were asked to perform math problems,
some easy, others more complex and memory intensive. Half the students completed both
problem types with nothing at stake, while the others completed them when calm and
under pressure. While everyone did well on the easy problems, those who were stressed
performed worse on the more difficult, memory-intensive tasks.

Speaker: Explicit monitoring theories make up the second group of explanations for choking under
pressure. They’re concerned with how pressure can cause people to overanalyse the task
at hand. Here, the logic goes that once a skill becomes automatic, thinking about its precise
mechanics interferes with your ability to do it. Tasks we do unconsciously seem to be most
vulnerable to this kind of choking.

Speaker: A study on competitive golfers compared their performance when instructed to simply
focus on putting as accurately as possible, versus when they were primed to be acutely
aware of the mechanics of their putting stroke. Golfers usually perform this action
subconsciously, so those who suddenly tuned in to the precise details of their own moves
also became worse at making accurate shots.

Speaker: Choking may not be inevitable for everyone though. Research suggests that some are
more susceptible than others, especially those who are self-conscious, anxious, and afraid
of being judged negatively by others.

Speaker: So, how can we avoid choking when it really counts? First, it helps to practice under
stressful conditions. In a study on expert *dart players, researchers found that those who
hadn’t practiced under stress performed worse when anxious, compared to those who
had become accustomed to pressure. Secondly, many performers extol the virtues of a
pre-performance routine, whether it’s taking a few deep breaths, repeating a cue word, or
doing a rhythmic sequence of movements.

Speaker: Studies on golfing, bowling, and water polo find that short rituals can lead to more
consistent and accurate performance under pressure. And thirdly, researchers have shown
that having an external focus on the ultimate goal works better than an internal focus,
where someone is tuned into the mechanics of what they’re doing.

Speaker: A study of experienced golfers revealed that those who hit chip shots while focused on the
flight of the ball performed significantly better than those who focused on the motion of
their arms. So, perhaps we can modify that age-old saying: practice, under pressure, with
focus, and with that glorious end goal in sight, makes perfect.

FOOOOTERAPPENDIXRIGHT
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 HEAAADERLOGORIGHT
TEACHER MATERIALS · UPPER-INTERMEDIATE (B2-C1)

HOW TO STAY CALM UNDER PRESSURE

Key

1. Warm up

5 mins.
Let the students know that in today’s lesson they will be watching a video about, staying calm under pressure.
To further set the context tell them about a time that you felt under pressure and how you managed to or didn’t
manage to stay calm.

2. Focus on vocabulary

5 mins.
Part A: Ask students to complete the gaps in the definitions with the appropriate vocabulary, taken from the video.
Students should work by themselves first and then compare with a classmate before all class feedback. Ensure
students are correctly pronouncing the target vocabulary.

1. stress and pressure 2. unpleasant memory

3. less effective 4. important part
5. know exactly 6. very strongly
7. a lot of praise 8. good quality
5 mins.
Part B: Ask students to fill in the gaps with the words from Part A, monitor and provide support where needed.
If students are struggling, then provide them with another example of the target language in context. Let the
students know that a different form of the word might be more appropriate in some examples.

1. virtues 2. acutely
3. choke 4. boils down to
5. haunted 6. undermine
7. extol
5 mins.
Provide the students with a chance to personalise the vocabulary, remind them that if they personalise new
vocabulary they are likely to remember it for longer. Monitor for mistakes with accuracy and provide delayed
error correction after the speaking task is completed.

3. Understanding the main idea

5 mins.
Ask students to watch the first 53 seconds of the video and answer the true or false questions. They should then
compare their answers with a partner and review as a class.

1. F- "...she misses the shot.."

2. T- "..it is common in spots"
3. F- "..public speakers, contestants in *spelling bees, and even world-famous musicians"
4. T- "Most people intuitively blame it on their nerves..."

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HOW TO STAY CALM UNDER PRESSURE

4. Listening comprehension

10 mins.
Ask students to watch the rest of the video and answer the questions. You may want them to read the questions
first and have the students predict their answers.

1. c.
2. a.
3. c.
4. b.
5. d.

6. Fill in the gaps to form the conclusion of the video: "practice, _______ , ________ , ___________, makes perfect":
→ b.

5. Adjectives

10 mins.
Ask students to match the adjectives and fill the gaps. All the adjectives come from the video. Ask the students
to then complete the statements and talk about whether they agree or disagree with the statement.
Part 1

1. → b. 2. → e. 3. → c. 4. → a. 5. → d.
Part 2

1. vulnerable 2. susceptible 3. inevitable

4. preoccupied 5. explicit

6. Talking point

10 mins.
Ask students to discuss the questions. Monitor and provide on the spot feedback and help as needed.

7. Speaking - roleplay

10 mins. Students work in pairs and use their imagination to come up with a dialogue involving:
a) An athlete who often chokes under pressure
b) A life coach hired to help the athlete stop choking
Encourage the students to take some time to think about their dialogue, try and get them to use the ideas and
vocabulary from the lesson. Students can prepare the roleplay together and then put two pairs together so that
the students can perform their roleplay for a couple of their classmates.

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