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The college team that changed disability sport: collocations such as raise awareness and make a difference

This B2 ESL lesson plan teaches verb + noun collocations such as raise awareness through the 1948 University of Illinois program for students with disabilities that Tim Nugent led.

Grammar
Nine fixed pairs, from break down barriers to gain access to: the verb changes its tense but is never swapped (make a difference, not do a difference).
Topic
A college program for students with disabilities, its wheelchair basketball team and the first national tournament, with words such as accessible, curb cut and halftime.
Activities
An explainer, a practice-court argument and a reader's voice memo, self-checking drills, a sports-day chat, ideas to sort and a question wheel.

What's inside

  1. Chapter 1Warm-up: everybody in

    • PictureUnlock
    • Open a box and answerOpen the boxUnlock
    • Study the words: sport for everyoneVocabularyTry it
    • Look at the pictures and choose the wordChoose by pictureUnlock

  2. Chapter 2Let's read: thirteen students and a basketball

    • Look at the photo: a game in an old gymPictureUnlock
    • Read Leona's explainer on The Why DeskArticleUnlock
    • Read and mark true or falseTrue or falseUnlock
    • Read again and choose the correct answerQuizUnlock
    • Match the paragraphs and the headingsMatchUnlock

  3. Chapter 3Let's listen: nothing but air

    • Listen to Leona and SeptimusListeningTry it
    • Transcript, for the teacherUnlock
    • Listen and choose the correct answerQuizUnlock
    • Listen to the Reader's Rebuttal: Verna's voice memoListeningUnlock
    • Transcript, for the teacherUnlock
    • Listen and mark true or falseTrue or falseUnlock

  4. Chapter 4Grammar: break down barriers, make a difference

    • Study the scheme: verb + noun collocationsGrammar schemeTry it
    • Choose the correct optionChoose the optionUnlock
    • Fill in the gaps: choose the right verb and use the correct formFill in the gapsTry it
    • Drag the words into the gaps: Coach Septimus's welcome noteDrag and dropUnlock
    • Choose the correct answer: what does it mean?QuizUnlock
    • Put the words in the correct orderUnjumbleUnlock

  5. Chapter 5Let's talk: a sports day for everyone

    • Choose the right replies: plan an inclusive sports dayChatTry it
    • Sort the ideas into the correct columns: inclusive or not?Sort into columnsUnlock
    • Spin the wheel and answer: sport for everyoneSpin the wheelUnlock

  6. Chapter 6Homework

    • Match the words and the meaningsMatchUnlock
    • Unscramble the wordsAnagramUnlock
    • Fill in the gaps with the lesson's wordsFill in the gapsUnlock
    • Find the matching pairs: words and meaningsMemory gameUnlock
    • Choose the correct option: new sentencesChoose the optionUnlock
    • Fill in the gaps: choose the right verb and use the correct formFill in the gapsUnlock
    • Fill in the table: past simple and present perfectFill in the tableUnlock
    • Choose the correct answer: which sentence is correct?QuizUnlock
    • Choose the correct option: Herb's post on the team's pageChoose the optionUnlock
    • Drag the words into the gaps: Leona answers VernaDrag and dropUnlock

34 exercises in 6 chapters. Start a 7-day free trial to open all of them, copy any part into your own lessons, and teach the lesson live.

Sports vocabulary

12 words and phrases from the lesson, each with a picture and audio in edio.

+9 more with pictures and audio in the lessonMore words

  • accessible
  • inclusive
  • curb cut
  • tournament
  • sports wheelchair
  • halftime
  • coverage
  • cheerleader
  • dribble

Grammar: verb + noun collocations

Some verbs and nouns simply belong together: you raise awareness and make a difference, and no other verb sounds right. A program that helped students gain access to college and a team that broke down barriers supply nine such pairs, so learners learn each pair as one piece, along with the preposition after the noun.

Break down barriers, raise awareness, make a difference

Some verbs and nouns always go together. Learn them as one piece: the verb can change its tense, but it is never swapped for another verb.

Nine verb + noun pairs

Break down barriers, raise awareness, set an example, make a difference, gain access, take part, pay attention, meet a need, face a challenge. Each noun picks its own verb, and Leona's story uses most of them: Curb cuts helped students gain access to buildings.

Nine collocations

Verb + nounWhat it meansExample
break down barriersremove what keeps people apartShared games broke down barriers between players.
raise awareness (of / about)help more people know about somethingThe games raised awareness of the sport.
set an example (for)act in a way that others can copyOlder players set an example for new ones.
make a difference (to / in)change something in a good wayThe program made a difference in many lives.
gain access (to)become able to enter or use something (also: get access)Curb cuts helped students gain access to buildings.
take part (in)join an activity or an eventSix teams took part in the tournament.
pay attention (to)watch, listen or think carefullyPay attention to your wheels, not the ball.
meet a need (meet the needs of …)give people what they needThe new ramp met a real need.
face a challengehave to deal with something hardIn 1949, Nugent faced a big challenge.

From Leona's story

  • Shared games helped break down barriers between players.
  • Cheerleaders and a square dance team helped raise awareness of the sport.
  • Curb cuts helped students gain access to buildings.
  • Six teams took part in the first national tournament.
  • In 1949, Nugent faced a big challenge: the campus was going to close.
  • Septimus thinks more TV time would make a difference.

The tense changes, the verb doesn't

The verb takes whatever form the sentence needs: broke down, has broken down; took part, have taken part; paid, met, set. Only the form moves, never the word: a past event is still raised awareness, not made awareness.

Base formPast simplePast participle
break down barriersbroke down barriersbroken down barriers
raise awarenessraised awarenessraised awareness
set an exampleset an exampleset an example
make a differencemade a differencemade a difference
gain accessgained accessgained access
take parttook parttaken part
pay attentionpaid attentionpaid attention
meet a needmet a needmet a need
face a challengefaced a challengefaced a challenge

Raise or rise?

Raise needs an object: you raise awareness, money or your hand. Rise has none: prices rise, the sun rises. So the past is raised awareness, while rose awareness mixes up the two verbs (rise, rose, risen).

raise or rise?

raise needs an object: you raise something (awareness, money, your hand). rise has no object: prices rise, the sun rises. So it's raise awareness, never rise awareness or make awareness. The forms: raise, raised, raised; rise, rose, risen.

No extra a, and the word after the noun

Take part in has no article: Six teams took part in it, not took a part in. The preposition belongs to the noun: awareness of or about, access to, an example for, a difference to or in, attention to. An adjective can come first: a real need.

No extra a, the right verb, the right little word

take part in has no a: Six teams took part in it (not took a part in). It's make a difference (not do) and break down barriers (not break off or break out). Learn the preposition after the noun too: awareness of / about, access to, an example for, a difference to / in, attention to. You can add an adjective: a big difference, a real need.

Common mistakes

Four slips swap the verb: do a big difference, rose awareness, make awareness, break off barriers. The cure is the verb the noun expects: make a big difference, raised awareness, raise awareness, break down barriers.

  • Small changes can do a big difference.

    Small changes can make a big difference.

    make a difference, never do

  • The games rose awareness of the sport.

    The games raised awareness of the sport.

    raise + an object; rise has no object

  • We want to make awareness of wheelchair sports.

    We want to raise awareness of wheelchair sports.

    awareness goes with raise

  • Shared games break off barriers.

    Shared games break down barriers.

    barriers: break down

Try the verb + noun collocations exercises

Try them yourself: these are the same exercises your students do in edio.

More exercises

What's in the lesson

  • 20 auto-checked exercises
  • 5 games
  • 1 article
  • 1 grammar scheme
  • 1 set of word cards
  • 2 audio clips
  • 2 pictures
  • 2 transcripts

The main objectives of this lesson are to:

  • use nine collocations as fixed pieces: Shared games broke down barriers between players. Six teams took part in the tournament.
  • choose the verb the noun expects: make a difference, not do a difference; raise awareness, not rise or make awareness
  • add the preposition after the noun: gain access to buildings, raise awareness of the sport, set an example for new players
  • change the tense, never the verb: Septimus has taken part in eleven tournaments. The new ramp met a real need.
  • plan an inclusive event and argue about TV time: If everyone plays in a sports wheelchair, we break down barriers.

Lesson 21 opens Sport and society, unit 6 of English B2.2 · Culture and Society. B1.2 lesson 20 sorted make from do, and lesson 12 of this course put prepositions after nouns (access to, a need for); now the verb before the noun matters too. Lesson 22 moves on to what phrasal verb particles mean. A story of access, awareness and broken barriers needs these pairs in almost every sentence.

Students open boxes of questions about sport, inclusion and TV time, then learn twelve words, from raise awareness and curb cut to halftime and dribble, with pictures and audio. They read Leona's explainer for The Why Desk, the course's online magazine, then hear her try wheelchair basketball and argue with Septimus, the coach, about TV coverage, and Verna, a player from Illinois, answer back in a voice memo; both are AI-voiced. The grammar chapter has the scheme and five self-checking drills, among them Coach Septimus's welcome note with verbs to drag in. In the speaking chapter, students plan a sports day with Kathy by chat, sort ideas into inclusive or not and spin a question wheel.

All ten homework tasks check themselves: a word match, an anagram, gaps with the sport words and a memory game, then verbs to choose and to put in the right form, a table of past simple and present perfect, a quiz on the correct sentence, Herb's thank-you post with verbs to choose and Leona's answer to Verna with words to drag in.

Grammar:
verb + noun collocations · make a difference · raise awareness · take part in · break down barriers
Topic:
Tim Nugent · the Gizz Kids · wheelchair basketball · the University of Illinois · disability sport · accessibility and curb cuts · sport and society · The Why Desk

Teaching tips

  • Hand out the nouns on cards before the scheme: barriers, awareness, a difference, access, part. Pairs guess the verb for each, then check their guesses against the table and its examples.
  • Ask how a wheelchair basketball player moves the ball before the reading. Then students read to find what the Gizz Kids' opponents had to do, and why Leona says it helped.
  • Play the gym dialogue once for the argument: who wants more TV time, and who says access comes first? On the second listen, students note every collocation, from pay attention to to face a real challenge.
  • Drill raise and rise out loud: call out a noun (awareness, prices, your hand, the sun), and students answer with the right verb in a past sentence: Prices rose. The game raised awareness.

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The whole course: English B2.2 · Culture and Society

32 more lessons for adults at B2 in American English, with the same Why Desk team in Pittsburgh. Each lesson answers one question about how Americans learn, work, travel and remember, from the law behind the 40-hour week to the oral histories of StoryCorps. Learners link ideas in formal writing, report what is said and believed, and pack more into a sentence with participle and relative clauses. The practice exercises check themselves.See the course

  1. Unit 1 Learning reimagined

    adjective suffixes and negative prefixes, mixed conditionals, provided that and on condition that

    1. Lesson 1College for farmers' kids?Adjective suffixes and negative prefixes
    2. Lesson 2One cousin, one video, millions of learnersMixed conditionals: a past cause, a result now
    3. Lesson 3A college that says yesConditional linkers: provided that, on condition that, assuming, otherwise
    4. Lesson 4School in the woodsMixed conditionals: a present state, a past result

  2. Unit 2 Work-life balance

    be required to and be entitled to, present and perfect participle clauses, participle clauses after conjunctions

    1. Lesson 5Who decided a week is 40 hours?Formal rules: be required to, be entitled to, be exempt from
    2. Lesson 6A paid year off: rest or research?Present participle clauses for time and reason
    3. Lesson 7Was the coffee break born in Wisconsin?Perfect participle clauses: having done and having been done
    4. Lesson 8Why is the first Monday of September a day off?Participle phrases after conjunctions

  3. Unit 3 Turning points

    reduced relative clauses, preposition + which and whom, which for a whole clause, noun + preposition

    1. Lesson 9The keyboard that opened the officeReduced relative clauses: -ing and the past participle
    2. Lesson 10Earthrise: the photo that changed how we see EarthPreposition + which and whom
    3. Lesson 11A city of white palaces for six monthsSentence relative clauses: which for a whole clause
    4. Lesson 12The count that took eight years?Noun + preposition: a need for, a solution to, access to

  4. Unit 4 News and truth

    although, whereas and while, the impersonal passive, despite and however, is said to have

    1. Lesson 13A newspaper of their ownLinkers of contrast: although, even though, whereas and while
    2. Lesson 14Bat-people on the Moon?The impersonal passive: It is said that…
    3. Lesson 15Read like a fact-checkerLinkers of contrast: despite, in spite of, however and even so
    4. Lesson 16Did George Washington really chop down a cherry tree?Passive reporting verbs: is said to have done

  5. Unit 5 Travel that gives back

    so as to, in order to and so that, modifying comparatives, linkers of reason and result, verb + object + preposition + -ing

    1. Lesson 17Seven rules for the wild?Linkers of purpose: to, in order to, so as to, so that
    2. Lesson 18A lottery to see firefliesModifying comparatives and superlatives
    3. Lesson 19Sunrise with the turtlesLinkers of reason and result
    4. Lesson 20Volunteer on vacation?Verb + object + preposition + -ing

  6. Unit 6 Sport and society

    verb + noun collocations, what phrasal verb particles mean, a for-and-against essay, nouns from phrasal verbs

    1. Lesson 21 · you're hereThe college team that changed disability sportVerb + noun collocations
    2. Lesson 22When women played pro baseballPhrasal verbs: what the particles mean
    3. Lesson 23Who needs a referee?The for and against essay: plan and linkers
    4. Lesson 24The comeback of Jim ThorpeNouns from phrasal verbs

  7. Unit 7 Buildings and heritage

    past participle clauses, quantifier + of which and of whom, report language, turn out and prove

    1. Lesson 25Homes built into the cliffsPast participle clauses with a passive meaning
    2. Lesson 26A house over a waterfallQuantifier + of which and of whom
    3. Lesson 27From factory to art museumReport language: headings, impersonal style, recommendations
    4. Lesson 28The towers the city tried to pull downTurn out and prove + to-infinitive or that clause

  8. Unit 8 Generations

    adverb + adjective collocations, three-part phrasal verbs, negative and echo questions, prepositional phrases

    1. Lesson 29Who decides where a generation ends?Adverb + adjective collocations
    2. Lesson 30Music students living in a retirement home?Three-part phrasal verbs
    3. Lesson 31Conversations kept for historyNegative questions and echo questions
    4. Lesson 32A day for grandparentsFixed prepositional phrases

Questions about this lesson

What are verb + noun collocations?
They're pairs in which the noun takes one fixed verb: you make a difference, raise awareness and take part, and swapping the verb sounds wrong (do a difference). The meaning is often easy to guess; the verb is the hard part. The B2 lesson The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai teaches nine of them with a 1948 program for students with disabilities.
How do you learn verb + noun collocations?
Learn the verb, the noun and its preposition together: gain access to, raise awareness of, set an example for. Then use the whole piece in any tense: has taken part, broke down barriers, paid attention. The verb changes its form, but it is never replaced by another verb. The scheme in The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai gives each collocation a meaning, an example and all three verb forms.
What are some examples of collocations?
Five from The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai: Shared games helped break down barriers between players. Cheerleaders and a square dance team helped raise awareness of the sport. Six teams took part in the first national tournament. Pay attention to your wheels, not the ball. In 1949, Nugent faced a big challenge. In each one, the verb is tied to its noun.
What's the difference between a collocation and a phrasal verb?
A phrasal verb is a verb plus a particle with its own meaning: break down can mean “stop working.” A collocation is a verb and a noun that usually go together: make a difference, break down barriers. The second example shows that a collocation can contain a phrasal verb. In edio.ai's English B2.2 course, The college team that changed disability sport teaches collocations, and the next lesson turns to phrasal verb particles.
Is it “make a difference” or “do a difference”?
It's make a difference, never do: Small changes can make a big difference. Awareness has its own verb too: raise awareness, not rise awareness or make awareness, because rise takes no object. And it's take part in, with no a. These slips are the common mistakes in the scheme of The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai, and each wrong reply in its chat makes one like them.
Who was Tim Nugent?
In 1948, the University of Illinois chose Tim Nugent, a 24-year-old graduate student from the University of Wisconsin, to lead a new program for students with physical disabilities on its campus in Galesburg, Illinois. He coached his students in bowling, swimming and basketball, started a national wheelchair basketball tournament in 1949 and became the first commissioner of the National Wheelchair Basketball Association. The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai tells the story.
Who were the Gizz Kids?
They were the wheelchair basketball team of Nugent's program, and Illinois says they were the first college wheelchair basketball team in the US. Their opponents played in wheelchairs too, even players who didn't use one, and the team had cheerleaders and a halftime square dance team. In April 1949, six teams took part in the first National Wheelchair Basketball Tournament, and the Gizz Kids placed third. The edio.ai lesson The college team that changed disability sport explains it.
How do I teach collocations to B2 students?
Teach the verb and the noun together, never the noun alone: present raise awareness, not just awareness. Start from a text where the pairs occur naturally, then sort them, gap them and reuse them with new tenses. The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai moves from Leona's explainer and a practice-court argument to the scheme, a verb choice, typed gaps, a coach's welcome note, a meaning quiz and word order.
What's a good game for practicing collocations?
Try collocation dominoes: each card has a noun on one half and a verb on the other, and students join raise to awareness, meet to a need and face to a challenge. For speaking, the wheel in The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai asks questions like How can a team raise awareness of a sport that few people watch?, in pairs or as a class.
What's good homework for collocations?
Good homework makes students choose the verb, then its form: Last year, our town ___ (meet / make) a real need, plus a table that puts each pair in the past simple and the present perfect. All ten homework tasks in The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai check themselves, and two of them are whole texts: Herb's thank-you post for his team and Leona's answer to Verna.
How do you practice collocations one-to-one?
Plan an event together, such as a club day or a fundraiser. The teacher asks How would you raise awareness? and Who could take part?, and the student answers with the whole collocation, then asks back. The chat in The college team that changed disability sport on edio.ai is done alone: Kathy plans an inclusive sports day, and the student picks the replies with the right verb.
Are there interactive exercises for verb + noun collocations?
Yes. This page plays three parts of The college team that changed disability sport, a B2 lesson on edio.ai, with no account. The three are the listening at Septimus's practice, a gap-fill where students choose each verb and its form and Kathy's chat about an inclusive sports day. Everything else needs an account.
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