Did you know that Italy produces more than 20% of the world’s wine? Which countries complete the top three? And what actually happens to grapes before they become wine? Celebrate August 28th – International Red Wine Day with this A2 lesson and discover how wine is produced from vineyard to bottle.
When creating lessons for International Red Wine Day, it would be easy to focus on wine tasting, famous wine regions, or food pairings. However, I wanted to create something a little different. Instead of talking about wine as a finished product, students explore how it is made by watching an Insider video How Wine Is Made. The lesson combines reading, listening, grammar, and speaking through the topic of wine production, and naturally introduces the Present Passive through an authentic video.
The class consists of a lesson plan, a presentation (for online teaching) and also a worksheet (for face-to-face teaching). You can find them all to download for free at the end of the post!
Warmer: How Much Do You Know About Wine?
The lesson begins with a short wine quiz. Students work in pairs and answer questions about grapes, vineyards, harvests, wineries, barrels, and corks. This quick activity introduces key vocabulary that will appear later in the lesson and helps activate students’ background knowledge. Next, students become wine experts for a moment and predict the world’s top ten wine-producing countries. Working in pairs, they write down their guesses before checking their answers in the reading task that follows.
Reading: The World’s Top Wine Producers in 2025
Students read short adapted descriptions of ten of the world’s leading wine-producing countries from an article by Interbrosa Family Wines titled Top Wine Producers in the World by Country and Region (2025). Instead of simply matching countries to percentages, they use clues to identify each country. They learn about famous wine regions, grape varieties, and unique characteristics of wine production around the world. The texts are deliberately presented out of ranking order, encouraging students to read carefully rather than simply follow a list. After completing the task, students compare the answers with their predictions and see how many countries they guessed correctly. A short reading comprehension then helps students revisit the text and identify key information about the world’s biggest wine producers.
Listening for Gist: How Is Wine Made?
Before watching the video, students look at the main stages of wine production and try to put them into the correct order. The stages are presented in the Present Passive, providing a subtle introduction to the target grammar before students formally analyse it. Students then watch the authentic Insider video, How Wine Is Made, and check their predictions. As they watch, they discover how grapes are harvested, transported, processed, fermented, and eventually turned into wine.
Listening for Detail: Active or Passive?
The second viewing focuses on language rather than content. Students are presented with pairs of sentences: one in the active voice and one in the passive voice. Their task is to identify which sentences are actually used in the video. This activity encourages students to notice the difference between active and passive structures before any formal grammar explanation is given. Because both forms appear naturally in the video, students can observe how each structure is used in context.
Grammar in Context: The Present Passive
Rather than starting with grammar rules, students first analyse the language from the listening task. They compare active and passive sentences and answer guided questions about the role of the subject in each structure. Once students have identified the pattern, they review the formation and use of the Present Passive. They consider why the agent is often omitted and discuss situations in which the action is more important than the person performing it. To consolidate the target language, students rewrite several active sentences from the video using the passive voice.
Describe and Guess: Production Processes
After practising the form in controlled activities, students move on to a more communicative task. Working in pairs, each student receives a different sequence of pictures showing a production process. Without showing the pictures, they describe the process using the Present Passive while their partner listens and guesses the product.
Final Discussion: All About Wine
The lesson finishes with a discussion about wine and wine culture. Students share their opinions about expensive wines, famous wine-producing countries, and food and wine pairing. Since the questions are opinion-based, learners can participate regardless of their previous knowledge of wine.
By the end of the lesson, students will have learned vocabulary related to wine production, discovered the world’s leading wine-producing countries, practised listening with an authentic video, and developed confidence using the Present Passive to describe processes.
Which country would you most like to visit for its wine?🍷
