During the 1950s a new group of actors emerged who captivated audiences, firstly on stage, later on screen. Talent, charm, charisma, personality, magnetism, attributes that could never be taught; actors such as Richard Burton, Richard Harris, John Hurt and Peter O’Toole had these gifts in abundance.
I was lucky in that living in London, I was able to go to the theatre and saw Mr John Hurt in ‘Month in the Country’, while I caught Peter O’Toole in ‘Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell’. Additionally, I once ‘met’ Mr O’Toole at a book signing in London.
Peter O’Toole in ‘Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell’
As for Mr Richard Harris, I had the pleasure of serving him one time in an upmarket bakery in west London. He was on form that day, possibly having partaken of a liquid lunch. Unfortunately, I did not get the opportunity to see Mr Richard Burton. Now, back to Peter O’Toole.
I have a great clip of the magnificent Irish actor being interviewed by the fast-talking USA TV host David Letterman. Students can compare the two accents.
Letterman asks O’Toole if he has a story about fellow actor, Richard Harris. Instead of a rather pedestrian, “Let me see …,” O’Toole, cigarette in hand, responds, “Oh, I’ll shuffle through my memory,” before proceeding to tell said story (this occurs at 0:32 – 3:33).
The activity can be extended by asking the students to copy O’Toole’s voice and elocution. Obviously I don’t condone smoking but students have had great fun sitting crossed legged, imaginary cigarette held aloft, and repeating, “Oh, I’ll shuffle through my memory.”
The serious aspect here is to demonstrate the rhythms and stresses in English – the elongated “oh,” as he thinks, the focus on the verb, “shuffle’, the linking of “through my,” and the final stressed but downwards – intonations of “memory.” A lot of work covered in just six words. Good value for your teaching bucks !
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The following websites are good for listening practice.
What are the pros and cons of each one ?
What do you like or dislike about them ?
How helpful do you find them ?
Try to use complex sentences in forming your answers, giving reasons and your thoughts.
Example: For me, the best site was (Speakgood.com) because it was well designed, easy to use and extremely helpful. I especially appreciated the subtitles which enabled me to understand what was being said.
This was recommended to me by my Brazilian friend, Ana (also a ESL teacher). Small news stories are told at three levels of English, and you can listen first, then read the text. Also a good way to learn new vocabulary. Having said that, the speaking is rather flat and lacking in intonation.
IELTS students always need to concentrate on expanding their lexical resources. Having said that, I feel this class needs extra work on fluency and pronunciation. To that end, some exercises to assist:
Exercise 1: Just a minute. In pairs, one student has to speak for one minute without repetition, hesitation or deviation.
The subjects are: Your favourite gift // your neighbourhood // what you like about your city // shopping // your family
Exercise 2: Newsreader. Read the following extracts with appropriate pronunciation, intonation and stress, not forgetting body language.
Some stories are sombre (sad, solemn), others convey information that is somewhat depressing or raise concern. However, we end with some lighter entertainment gossip and football transfer speculation.
LONDON — Queen Elizabeth II returned to royal duties just four days after the death of her husband, Prince Philip, with her first in-person event Tuesday.
The queen hosted a ceremony at Windsor Castle for William Peel, who retired after serving for 14 years as lord chamberlain, the most senior aide in the royal household.
A report by the World Travel and Tourism Council, or WTTC, has revealed the full extent of the damage done to the global travel industry in 2020 after business was devastated by the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Globally, the sector’s income slumped by almost $4.5 trillion last year. In 2019, travel and tourism was linked to one in four of all new jobs created around the world. But in 2020, more than 62 million jobs were lost.
HCMC – The Ministry of Health has confirmed 16 new imported Covid-19 cases in Ba Ria-Vung Tau, Hanoi, Danang, Quang Nam and HCMC, taking the country’s tally to 2,733 as of tonight, April 14.
Five of the new cases were reported in Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province. The patients, aged between 29 and 39, returned to Vietnam from Russia on Flight VN5062 on April 12. They were immediately transported to Ba Ria-Vung Tau for quarantine after arriving at the HCMC-based Tan Son Nhat International Airport. All of them are being treated at Long Dien District Medical Center.
Who is Hey Stephen by Taylor Swift about?
The song is about a crush Taylor had on Stephen Barker Liles, who’s in the band Love and Theft.
The two reportedly met in 2008 when his band was opening up for her on tour.
Speaking to Access Online, Taylor said: “The song is actually about a guy who I had a crush on and never told him.
“So I wrote everything that I was thinking down in the song instead of telling him.”
Manchester United are eager to re-sign Cristiano Ronaldo from Juventus – according to Sai Gon Post.
The Red Devils will consider an exchange deal that would see Paul Pogba return to Turin in order to bring Ronaldo back to Old Trafford this summer.
United are on course to receive a big payout for finishing in the Premier League’s top four again, and plan to put those funds towards the re-capture of a club legend.
See you next week
Vietnam festival, London 2012 … it was raining cats and dogs !
A Thai princess at Wat Benchamabophit Dusitvanaram, Bangkok, 2011
A personal blog for one of my special students, my Princess, but one which will, hopefully, be of use to princesses everywhere.
We like to encourage students to imitate the speech patterns of native-speakers by which I mean the way we link words together, form contractions (‘I’d’ instead of ‘I would’ etc), and use paralinguistics to convey meaning (intonation, stress, body language).
However, students need individual assistance so while my Princess has remarkable lexical resources, as well as the ability to tell an anecdote or two, she could improve aspects of her pronunciation.
Therefore, I have prepared some clips for princesses the world over to use for speaking practice … and so, without further ado, princesses prepare to sound like a Queen
Clip 2 features Angela Rippon, who was the first woman to present the news on the BBC. Interestingly, she is announcing the General Election of 1979 that lead to the first woman Prime Minister in the UK, Margaret Thatcher:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysVzc3hSB50&ab_channel=bbctim123
Thay Paul's Notes 