Distinction mini review

I still think the world is lacking an outstanding Advanced level book, let along a half-decent Pre-Advanced level one. Therefore it is well worth looking at Distinction for an FCE level class that has no interest in the exam, despite the fact that is a rather hit and miss affair and looks rather dated now. The only real option at this level seems to be English Panorama One. This book is better than that one for giving students serious topics to explore and lots of vocabulary input (if almost all individual words rather than phrases or collocations). It certainly has a different ‘feel’ to most other EFL books around, as so is worth looking at for a class that has already worked their way through a couple of textbooks. The best way to approach it is to rush through stuff you students have no personal interest in, then extend the other units with the use of film, songs etc. (which is easy to do given the topics).