Compare these two photos; which class do you think was more dynamic ?
Photo 1Photo 2
The basic lesson was the same: what are you doing now, add a connector (or discourse marker) and say what you want in the future.
Students are taught how to use vernacular language, practise changes in intonation and alterations in stress, as well as chunking (natural linking together of words).
The photos, as the saying goes, tell their own story.
Photo 1 is from a high-level IELTS class where I wanted to increase vocabulary, and encourage the students to use more intonation … or basically ANY intonation in their voice.
The topic went down like the proverbial Led Zeppelin (and I wasn’t feelin’ a Whole Lotta Love for the class). I managed to elicit some half-arsed replies before they returned to their mobiles (or cell phones if you’re in the USA) or their natural comatosed state.
On the other hand, take a gander (have a look) at the second photo; same basic lesson target, but my goodness, what a difference, and this from an intermediate class.
Both classes were small in size (about six students) and predominantly teenagers, so how do we account for the chasm between them ?
To use academic language (for one of my new IELTS students):
This would seem to suggest that it was the students, as opposed to the lesson, that was the issue.
Words such as ‘inspire’ or ‘motivate’ are synonymous with teaching. However, as someone who attempts to teach, I must add that a successful lesson relies on synergy; one cannot motivate those who actively resist being motivated.
Teachers only have so much energy, and they can’t afford to waste it on customers who shuffle into class, scowling, ignoring the teacher, sitting at the back clutching their bag, defensively, in front of them before becoming engrossed in their phones and ignoring any questions put to them. I’m not talking about children here, but young adults or adults, on a course that they chose, and need for their future.
I wish I were.
So, to my great students, who come to class willing to learn, to be active, to practice and are polite and respectful:
Class will be arranged in four small groups and they will be assigned a city. The students have an hour to collect information, produce a short journal (with maps, photos, illustrations etc) and present to the class.
The destinations are:
London, Barcelona, Seoul & Rio de Janeiro
I shall provide some photo printouts for their covers.
The journal must include:
When to go // an itinerary // a famous museum or building // how the students got there
London: best time to go is in Spring // British Museum is free -Open daily 10.00 am – 5.00 pm // Take the Tube (subway) to Holborn // Hamleys Toy Shop – Open 11.00 – 5.00 // Take the 25 bus and walk down Regent Street.
Barcelona: Best time is May – June // Gaudi Church (Sagrada Familia) Open 9.00 – 7.00 pm // Take Metro Line 2 (subway) // Have a picnic in Gaudi park (Parc Güell) – Open 9.30 – 7.00 pm) -get there by taxi // At night walk along the famous street Las Ramblas and walk around the old town centre
Seoul: Best time is summer // Seoul Tower – take bus number 2 – Open 10.00 – 11.00 pm // Traditional village – take a taxi. // Walk around, visit small museums and try traditional food // At night, walk along city creek and try Korean street food.
Cheonggyecheon Stream in central Seoul
Rio de Janeiro: best time is February, for the Festival // Walk there from your hotel // Visit the Christ statue – take a taxi but go early morning. // Go to the beach at Ipanema – take the Metro Rio (Subway) // Try amazing Brazilian food like crazy beef or foot bug ! //
Young Alfred Hitchcock felt so proud. His father, a strict and nervous man, had entrusted his son with a duty that made the infant of four or five feel like a young man.
Hitch ran along Leytonstone High Road, in the East-End of London, to the police station, with no suspicion of the notorious family plot being hatched.
Alfred confidently approached the huge desk and, tiptoeing up, stretched to put the note into the giant hand of the formidable policeman.
The Officer took the note, unfolded it, read it, closed it again, and stared down at the beaming face of the boy. After a moment of silence, he said:
“Come with me.”
How honoured Alfred felt now, a respectable keeper of the peace was leading him by the hand and showing him the inside of the station.
They went up to a cell, which the Officer unlocked and beckoned the lad inside.
Alfred needed no second telling, he gladly entered.
Then the door closed with a heart-stopping crash, and he could hear the metal screeching of the heavy keys turning the locks.
There he stayed, in the terrifying cold of the dungeon, too small to look out of the bars, too scared to scream. He was petrified.
There he stayed for five or ten minutes, until he was finally released. The only explanation were the words that stayed with him for the rest of his life:
“This is what we do to naughty boys.”
Unsurprisingly, many of his films have the theme of an innocent man caught up in something he doesn’t understand or have control over.
Around fifty-five years later, the film ‘Psycho’ was released.
Thirty-four years after that, in 1994, a film student chose it as the subject of his thesis.
Alan Francis had moved up to London to read Film Studies, and shared a bedsit in Leytonstone with three other students. He frequently walked past the petrol station that has been built on the site where ‘The Master of Suspense’ was born.
It was Alan’s contention that ‘Psycho’ was as near perfect as a film could ever get. Rather than being threatened by television, which had devoured Hollywood’s audiences in the Fifties, Hitchcock, acting as his own Producer, had used a television crew, used to tight budgets and tighter schedules, to shoot the film.
Mosaic of ‘Psycho’ at Leytonstone Underground Station
But he took time and care when needed. The famous shower scene took seven days to shoot, using seventy cameras for forty-five seconds of film.
Alan also mentioned that the film had cost eight hundred thousand dollars and before the decade had ended, had already grossed over fifteen million.
Over the Summer months, Alan waited with appropriate suspense, for his results. He had had enough with theory, he now wanted to make films. But the chances of breaking into the film business were not good. The best thing, he decided, was not to send off letters or work his way up in studios, but to actually make a film, to show people what he could do.
There were so many ideas stored up, so many theories of cinema to test out. All he needed was a camera. And actors. And film stock. For these, he needed money.
In July 1994, Alan looked for jobs and was accepted by a firm of business consultants. His theories on film would not be required for the post. So he saved his money. And waited.
Till the end of his life, Alfred Hitchcock never forgot the paralysing fear of being locked in that cell. And he was never able to remember what it was that he had done, that caused his father to punish him so.
Describe these pictures, using adjectives and your opinions.
Highlands Coffee has great coffee, air-con and free wifi. Having said that, the service is a little slow, there are no waiters and the cost is unbelievably expensive !
Vietnam is famous for coffee; coffee shops are ubiquitous. In fact, there are so many, it’s hard to see (difficult to understand) how they stay in business let alone turn a profit.
Be that as it may, let’s use this as a learning opportunity. To practice making longer sentences, and as a warm up exercise, the students can ask each other, “Where do you go for coffee ?”
Tips:
Don’t answer the question directly and immediately; Begin with a short introduction:
Sai Gon has so many coffee shops, some are cheap while others can be quite expensive although they have a wide range of delicious coffee. Personally, I like going to …
Then
Explain:
How MUCH do you like it (adverbs) ?
What kind of coffee (adjectives) ?
What do you think about this ? (opinions)
WHY do you like it (give reasons)
Interesting words, phrases, idioms
Personally, I like Tap Coffee which is an independent shop where I live. I enjoy going there so much because the owner is very friendly and tries to speak English with me. There isn’t a lot of choice, so I order cappuccino with hot, fresh milk. In my opinion, it is good value and tastes delicious. What I like about the shop is the free wifi, the comfortable chairs and the atmosphere. Furthermore, it is usually very quiet and it therefore a good place to read. I love to put my feet up, kick back and sip my damn fine coffee.
Before the exercise, elicit and board as many relevant words and phrases as required. The students have a discourse marker list, so I could insist that they use certain words (moreover, therefore, consequently etc). Additionally, I’ll need to explain vernacular phrases such as ‘kick back’ and ‘put my feet up’.
IF a student doesn’t like coffee, then they can say where they go and what they drink. IF they don’t go anywhere or like anything (yes, I have had that in a class), then they can explain WHY NOT!
Key vocabulary: ambience // aroma //atmosphere
Grammar Note:
In a list of three, use one comma and a linking word (and):
The service is a little slow, there are no waiters and the cost is unbelievably expensive !
In a list of two, just use a linking word (and):
Mega Mart has amazing choice and is good value for money.
How to make Vietnamese coffee
Tell me: what do I need ? What type of coffee is best ? Where can I buy it ?
New verbs: pour / stir / fill up /
Make a long, fluent presentation.
Signpost expressions: used to help tell a story or a narrative. They allow the listener to help organise the information.
Useful words or expressions:
Firstly / afterwards / and then / following that /
don’t forget to … / you can always ….
lastly / finally / at the very end …
In your experience, what coffee is best ? Trang Nguyen, Highlands or Milano ? Maybe street coffee ?
Speaking practice:
Pat Well, I’m exhausted. I need a damn fine cup of coffee and a big piece of pie.
Sam There’s a Highlands over the road, or we can go to Coffee Bean or Milano.
Pat I’d prefer Tran Nguyen but it costs an arm and a leg. Highlands is also incredibly expensive.
Sam But great quality and superb cakes. Come on, I’m starving, I need coffee now !
Pat OK, hold your horses hahaha. After we can meet up with Thay Paul.
Sam Sounds good. Now … shall we have chocolate cake or fruit cake … ?
costs an arm and a leg = very expensive
hold your horses = please be patient and wait
Inside HighlandsCoffee Shop
Highlands Coffee, a Vietnamese coffee chain
Sam Hi, I’ll have a large cappuccino, please. What do you fancy ?
Pat Tough decision. I’m going for the cheesecake and a slice of blueberry pie.
Sam Oh, me too. Big slice, no, only joking, I have to watch my weight.
Pat I think you look great. Lets also get some chocolate cake and we can share.
Sam Brilliant. Oh, did I show you my recent photos ? Here, on my phone.
Pat Let me see … oh, so funny. Who’s that ? The man next to Niall ?
Sam That’s Jimmy, he’s in Niall’s band. He plays drums and drinks like a fish !
Pat And that’s you, a selfie. You look adorable. Butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth !
A very sweet young lady – butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth
drinks like a fish = drinks a lot of alcohol
Butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth ! = looks very sweet and nice … but can be very naughty
“Don’t have the exact date, but around the end of July. I can’t believe it. Back to Berlin.”
Richard had to shout a little above the noise of the pub. There were highlights of a World Cup game showing Bulgaria beating the mighty Germany, and the London pub was cheering as loudly as any in Sofia. Richard’s attention wandered to the screen when he thought Melanie wasn’t looking, but he was caught out and had to suffer her views on football and football supporters, but knew enough to keep his views on her views, to himself.
It was also the first time he had seen her in a skirt, a pretty skimpy one, that showed off legs that were smooth and shapely. He was prepared to contemplate a complete review of the Melanie situation.
Maybe it was the skirt, the warm Summer night, or the joy of seeing Germany beaten without the inevitable heartbreak of watching England lose (as they hadn’t even been able to qualify), but the conversation, after three or four drinks, became the most revealing the two ever had. No reviews of art, or humorous small-talk, usually with Chris as the butt, or hints of truths that suddenly pulled back. They actually got to know a little about each other.
After ten o’clock, they decided to spend the last drinking hour at the Coach and Horses, a pub famous for it’s artistic clientele, actors, painters and writers and therefore infamous for its collection of would-be actors, painters and writers. A simple “excuse me”, or a “hello” would be met by a laboured and over-rehearsed half-witticism, or a meaningless epigram.
They got two seats at a large table and had to politely smile as a man with long, straight hair and a cane, offered salutations. Then they got down to business.
Richard asked about her relationship with Chris. What exactly was it ? He wasn’t prepared for the answer.
“Oh, we’re married.”
Richard paused, the wine glass half-way to his lips.
Then Melanie laughed.
It was an even greater shock, now, to discover that Melanie had a mischievous sense of humour. And great legs, that inspired alcohol-fueled aspirations. She clarified.
“No, but we did go out for a time. Yeah, we were dating. Boyfriend and girlfriend. But, there was no sex, obviously.”
“Obviously ?”
“Well, Chris, you know, and I … you know … it was cool.” Melanie was biting her lip and nodding her head, expecting Richard to be able to fill in the gaps.
“What, you didn’t have sex ?”
“No, of course not. I mean we were … intimate … with each other … but there was control … ” Back to the nodding.
Richard was having difficulty processing, and restraining the “WHAT ?” that was screaming to be let loose.
“Well … what’s the point in that ?”
“What do you mean ?”
“To have a girlfriend and not … have … not … Just … what’s the point ?”
“It was what we both wanted …”
“Both ?”
“Yeah. I mean, you must know about Chris … ?”
“No.”
“No ? What do you boys speak about ?”
Again, that phrase, ‘you boys’. Richard let it slide, the revelation was too big.
“Man stuff. TV programs. Quantum Mechanics; had some quite heated debates over that. Football. Sweets from our childhood that no longer exist. ‘Spanglers’, for instance.”
“And women ?”
“No, sir, never. Almost never. OK, but not always. Yeah, a lot of talk about women. I didn’t know with Chris it was just all talk. I’m going through a fallow patch, admittedly, but that’s just to replenish the oats. I’ll be back ploughing soon enough …”
“Ah, don’t gross me out.” Just then, the music stopped and there was a momentary volume drop in the bar. Richard continued, at his previous level;
“That’s why it’s more fun with men.”
The long-haired man next to Melanie slowly turned towards him, and raised his glass. Music re-started.
“Talking, I mean. So, you and Chris … never … ?”
“That’s right. Can’t believe he’s not told you. That’s why I knew it would never work out with Ute. She’s used to sex. It’s hard to go from being sexually active to celibacy.”
Something wasn’t quite right about this, thought Richard, but again, he thought he shouldn’t push any further. He envisaged some very interesting conversations when he got back to Berlin. And Monika ? Did Melanie think she was also in a celibate relationship with Chris ? Was that what she meant, claiming she was ‘her kind of woman’ ? Was Melanie gay ? Tonight, it seemed, anything was possible. But, in the best tradition of show business, or, in this environment, show-off business, Richard was saving the best till last.
“I’m in love. And she’s German.”
“Wow ! That’s great. Who is she ?”
“Her name’s Käthe. She has platinum blonde hair, dark eyes and is just gorgeous. And she going to be driving me to Berlin. Along with her boyfriend.”
On 8th April, 1994, the body of Kirk Cobain, singer and guitarist of the band Nirvana, was found at his Seattle home. He died from a gunshot wound to the head.
The pop-culture space-race that had been going on between Britain and The States since the Fifties was now firmly in the American orbit, as the amount of small bands who spent limited money on equipment, not designer clothes, seemed to reach stratospheric heights.
Britain’s alternative scene has seen Indie Pop branch out into the tiny Grebo movement, a kind of home-grown pre-Grunge which combined music and humour in equal doses, before people smartened up and went dancing with the aid of little smiley tabs.
There was a definite vacuum that needed filling, and the music, attitudes and fashions of Grunge, of Slacker, of Generation X seemed tailor-made, and all that tailor need provide were flashy baseball caps, checked shirts and jeans with a rip or two.
It was the three chords of punk, with the freedom to add a fourth or fifth and, hey, guitar solos can be cool, providing they’re shit hot. The lyrics were personal and poetic. And a reaction, the reaction that a lot of people felt, shaking their heads and wondering,’ What the fuck happened in the Eighties ?’ a realization that no catchy slogans were going to change society, and anyway, no point picking on individual countries, they were merging into bland, soulless, multinational corporations, whose twin gods were uniformity and profit. And the ones blackballed from the club were in the black hole of poverty and disease.
There were new causes, arguments that seemed irrefutable; the need to protect our water, our land, our air, yet the corporations found ways to argue and stall and ignore and undermine.
It was the last decade of the most remarkably innovative century in the history of this planet, and a fitting time for reflection and criticism. A century when civilized nations embarked on unspeakable, unimaginable, incomprehensible barbarity, and all that came out of that was the slogan, ‘Never Again’, but by the early 90’s it already had, and as the decade wore on, it happened elsewhere, it happened again, and then later, it happened again and then, elsewhere … it happened again.
In his suicide note, Kurt Cobain referred to himself as a ‘experienced simpleton’. He hadn’t found what he needed in the music business and didn’t want to go on pretending, but other people, on the outside, across the nation, across the ocean, were happy to keep looking.
It may have been the end of Grunge Rock, but the Slacker movement and lifestyle just got bigger and bigger.
“Says he’s working for a temp agency again. As kitchen porter. Fucking Hell! “
Chris broke off to explain to Monika about Richard’s job, then continued reading the letter.
“And he misses Berlin. Good. He should come back. We could find him a job, couldn’t we ?’
“For sure. He has been here, before ?’
The story of how they met and Richard’s two trips to Berlin were briefly related. Chris took a bite of toast as Monika poured more coffee, and read further, nodding. It wasn’t in the letter, but he had obviously seen Melanie, as he had the new address. One line made him exclaim;
“Yeah, that’s right, Dude, you coulda.”
Monika looked over, her icy blue eyes asking for clarification. Her English was only basic and Chris’ use of slang and Americanisms sometimes threw her.
“Oh, he’s just saying how he if he’d stayed at Uni, he’d of graduated by now. Last year, in fact. Ha, then he jokes about what he’s done, instead. A year at a bookshop, six months at a record store, six weeks in Berlin, the rest washing kitchen floors. What’s this ?”
“What is ?” asked Monika, in her heavy accent.
“I dunno, something about being locked in a freezer. ”
“So ? Is he coming over ? I think you would like that, no ?”
“Yeah, I would.”
“Does he need a flat ? I could ask The Gang.”
“No, he’ll stay here. After Rigaer Strasse, this is a palace. What time do you start ?”
“One. I told you.”
“Just checking. So we have time.”
“For what ?” asked Monika, with mock innocence. Chris raised his eyebrows and smiled.
Thay Paul's Notes 