Sharing a lesson

[cecileanne]

Hello,

Here's a lesson I'd like to share. Please feel free to suggest improvements or ideas.
It’s about having students watch an English video in order to
1) improve oral comprehension skills
2) learn new vocabulary
3) write humoristic text or oral presentation.

Title : What does it mean to be the President of the USA ?
Tested with: Frenchstudents aged 14-15 (year 10 or 9th grade)
Class size: 27 students
Procedure:
1) Classwork
#1. Play the film How To Become President (15 minutes) on Utube website.
#2. Have the students explain the general meaning.
#3. Play the film again making pauses so that students can react, spot new vocabulary or phrases and write a vocabulary sheet.

2) Pairwork (2 students per computer)
#1. The students play How to become president and stop when necessary to improve their understanding of the document.
#2. They fill in a worksheet (see below).

3) Individual work
Write a humoristic text or make an oral presentation about what it means to be English, American, Australian, Italian … or what it means to live in New York, Washington, Dallas …. or what it means to be a lumberjack, a teacher, a nurse …. using stereotypes or funny
set ideas.

WORKSHEET

1) What do you need to become president ? ………………………...........
What is optional ? ………………………………………………………………………………….
2) Official rules
Step 1 : Be a natural born ………………………………………………………
Where do you have to be born ?.................................. or ……………………………...
What about if you were born abroad ? ………………………………………………………….
Step 2 : How old do you have to be ? …………………………………………………………..
3) Unofficial rules
Step 3 : Be ……………………………………………………………………………….
………………… people work in Congress or are ……………………………………
Step 4 : Be …………………………………………………………………………… and straight.
What rule has expired in November 2008 ? …………………………………………………
Step 5 : Be a ………………………………………………………………
Which president was a catholic ? …………………………………………………………………
What has been the religion or the majority of the US presidents ? ………………
Step 6 : Be ………………, preferably to an …………………. and ………………..woman.
An American president has to be married because American people ……………
Step 7 : Be ……………………………………………………………………..
How many presidents were born poor ? ………………………………………
Abraham Lincoln belonged to the ……………………………….. –class.
At least ……….. of the American presidents were in the …………………………………percent of society and more than a ……………………………in the …………………….. .
So …………………………………………… your pennies now !
Step 8 : Be ……………………………………………………… , which means :
-be truthful but not necessarily ………………………………………….
- talk about ……………………… but not necessarily ……………………………
- advocate ………….. that are in your ……………………………………, your
……………… and your major donors’ ………………………………
but say they are in the best ………………….. of ………………….......... .
Step 9 : Anybody can ………………………………………………………………….............……
unless they are ………………………………………………………………………. !!!

[Tdol]

How about a lead-in before showing the video?