🛸 State vs Action: I Know, Not I'm Knowing!

The second lesson of the B1.1 Compact 36 journey, following the A2 systems check. The target is a tiny rule with a big payoff — it cleans up years of 'I'm loving it' English: state verbs, the verbs for thoughts (know, believe, understand, remember), feelings and wants (love, like, hate, want, need), having (have, own, belong) and appearance (seem, look), take the present simple only and never the continuous, even when talking about right now. The lesson opens with an error-detection warm-up: five tap-to-reveal 'alien transmission' clips — four with state-verb errors ('I am knowing your language') and one correct action-verb decoy — so students discover the problem before the rule is named. The grammar focus contrasts watchable actions ('two gears': simple and continuous) with internal states ('one gear only'), using formula blocks, a colour-coded grid of twelve state verbs sorted into four families, a families reference table, the one-second test ('Can you watch somebody do it?'), and a 'special agents' box for the dual-use verbs have (own = state / activity = action) and think (opinion = state / mental activity = action). The famous rule-breaker 'I'm lovin' it' is addressed head-on: ads break the rule on purpose — in class it is still 'I love it'. The reading is a ~450-word humorous story in which Zorp, an alien exchange student, keeps using -ing with state verbs until classmate Mira teaches him the rule, complete with the billboard scene and the two faces of have; key words carry hover-tooltip definitions. The eight target verbs appear in a vocabulary table and six receive detailed flashcards. Practice is an 8-item correction relay (items 1–4 fix Zorp's sentences, items 5–8 choose simple vs continuous, with third-person -s traps and two genuine action-continuous items) with live validation, hints and score tracking. Speaking is a set of truth interviews built on state-verb questions, with partner facts reported to the class in the third person; writing is a 50–70 word 'true me' paragraph with a 4-point checklist and live word counter; and the lesson closes with a full 8-question multiple-choice quiz featuring a progress bar, per-question explanations, a result circle with tiered motivational feedback and localStorage persistence — plus a homework mission: catch one state-verb sentence in any song, film or ad and bring it to class.