Intermediate: Lab 7 (Science fiction and the future)

In “There Will Come Soft Rains,” written in 1950, Ray Bradbury imagined the Earth 76 years in his future.

A. Can you think of other science fiction books or movies that imagine the future?
Name of book or movie __________________________________________________

What is different about humans’ lives in this future story? Categories of different things might include …

• communication technology
• home technology
• how we work
• transportation
• medicine
• entertainment
• government
• family life

Some science fiction futures are dystopian (technology has brought a bad future) or post-apocalyptic (manmade or natural disasters have destroyed modern society).

List at least three things about the future in your book or movie that are different from our lives now. Try to be specific. Example: “People communicate directly through their minds. They do not have to use telephones.

1. _________________________________
2. _________________________________
3. _________________________________

B. Now imagine your idea of humans’ lives in the future. Will our lives be better or worse?
Choose three of the categories above. How will these things be different 200 year in the future?

• Be specific with details.
• Use future tense verbs.
• You should have at least 9 sentences total (3 sentences per paragraph).

Write your ideas on the back of your lab page. If you need more space, use another piece of paper or type your paragraphs.

Two hundred years in the future, __________________ will be different. ________ (…)

In the future, _________________________ will also be different. ________ (…)

Even _____________________________ will be different in the future. ________ (…)

C. Bonus (1 point)
Include a picture of what you think our future will look like in 200 years. It can be a picture you find or a picture you draw. It should match what you have written about in part B.

Foundations: Lab 7 (National dress)

Prepare a presentation for the class about the national dress (clothes) of your country.

Your presentation should be about 3 minutes long (not longer).

Show us the traditional dress of your country and talk about it. You may use pictures or real items of clothing.

You should include at least three of these things:

• Clothing for men
• Clothing for women
• Clothing for children
• When the traditional dress is worn (for special days only? or every day?)
• Instructions on how to put on and wear the clothing
• Common colors and styles
• Symbolism of the dress (what does it mean?)
• History of the dress

(If there is more than one student from your country in the class, you may share the presentation and talk about all of the things.)

NOTE: If you use a PowerPoint presentation, DO NOT read from the slides. If you do this, you will lose points. It would be best not to put any sentences on your slides. You should be speaking freely, not reading or reciting.

Bring your lab paper to class on Friday with your presentation.

Foundations: Lab 6 (Phone Message)

This is an internet lab. You may do it at any computer that allows you to listen to audio and allows you to print.

1. Go to esl-lab.

2. Under General Listening Quizzes in the Easy column, click on “Phone Message.”
Pre-Listening Exercises:
Imagine you have answered the phone. The caller asks to speak with someone. That person can not come to the phone. You say:
“I’m sorry, he can’t come to the phone right now. He’s __________.”

What are three ways to complete that sentence?
Example: He’s out of the office right now.
a. ________________________________________________________________________________
b. ________________________________________________________________________________
c. ________________________________________________________________________________

3. Follow the instructions in part II, Listening Exercises. You may listen as many times as you want. Answer the questions.
1.
2.

3.

4.

5.
5. Do do Part III, Post Listening Exercises.
Mixed-Up Sentence
Sentence:

Sentence and Vocabulary Matching
Sentences:
-
-
-
-
-
Text Completion Quiz
Answers:
1                    6
2                    7
3                    8
4                    9
5                    10

6. What does “right off the bat” mean?

________________________________________________________________________________

7. On Friday, bring this page, with your answers, to class.

Intermediate: Lab 6 (Movie reviews)

Think of your favorite movie, or a movie you have seen recently.

Title of movie: _____________________________________

Your opinion of the movie (use adjectives from chapter 13 or otherse):

Now think about the answers to these questions. You will use this information to write a review of the movie. (If you don’t know some of the information about the movie, search in www.imdb.com .)

1.The movie stars _______ as _______, (name all the important actors and characters). The acting by _______ (name of actor or actress) was especially good. (describe why it was good)
2.Plot synopsis: [Summarize what happens in a few sentences, but try not to give away the ending]
3.The part of the movie I liked best was _____________ because ________.
4.I (liked / didn’t like) this movie because _____.
5.I ( would / would not ) recommend this movie to my friends because _____. [even if you didn't like the movie it might be very well done and others might like it.]

Now write a review of the movie in three paragraphs.

Here is an example written by Shayna. You may use this as a model. Please do not copy reviews from the internet.

Joe versus the Volcano is a silly but touching movie directed by John Patrick Shanley. It tells the story of Joe Banks, a man who is afraid of many things in life. But when Joe finds out he is going to die soon, he stops being afraid. He quits his horrible job and takes an offer to go on exciting voyage. At the end of the trip, he must save an island by jumping into a volcano. During the movie, Joe meets several women who help him along.

The main character, Joe, is played by Academy Award winning actor Tom Hanks. Hanks does a good job. He makes Joe amusing and likeable. The three women in the movie are all played by actress Meg Ryan. Ryan is versatile, and she makes the three different characters feel like different, interesting people.

My favorite part of the movie was near the end when Joe thought about his past and said, “I’ve come a long way, on a crooked road.” This was interesting because of a visual theme in the movie: a crooked line that appears in several different places, including a company logo, a bolt of lightning, and the road to the top of the volcano. In fact, the movie was full of thoughtful symbolism. It’s like a modern fairy tale. I would recommend this movie to fans of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, as well as people who like simple stories with lots of symbolism.

Please type your review, print it, and bring it to class on Friday.

Foundations: Lab 5 (Vacations)

In this lab, you will tell us about a vacation or trip you took in the past.

1. Choose a vacation or trip you took.

2. Find some pictures of the place.

• These can be pictures you took or pictures you find on the internet.
• Choose at least 1 (minimum) but no more than 7 (maximum) pictures.

3. In class on Monday, describe your vacation.

* You must use past tense.

* You must answer these questions:

• When did you go? (”In 2005,…)
• Where did you go? (”I went to…”)
• What did you do there? (”I swam in the ocean and visited the aquarium.”)
• How long did you stay? (”I stayed for…”)
• What was your favorite thing about the vacation? (”My favorite thing was…”)

4. Also, describe your picture(s).

* You do not have to have a Powerpoint presentation, but you may if you want to.

* Your presentations must be less than 3 minutes. (Maximum 3 minutes)

Example:

“In May of this year, I went to the Grand Canyon, Arizona, with my parents. We drove from Arkansas and traveled for one week. We visited the Grand Canyon, went for a hike in the Canyon, visited Petrified Forest National Monument, and saw the Hoover Dam. My favorite things were the ancient rock paintings and the wild animals we saw.”

“This is a California condor. They are very rare. We saw them at the Grand Canyon.”

“This is the Hoover Dam. It is really huge!”

Intermediate: Lab 5 (Travel brochures)

For this lab, you will make an advertisement for a tourist attraction.

1. Choose a monument or other tourist attraction that you have visited.

2. Answer these questions about the attraction:

• Where is it located? (Country, nearest city)
• When was it built, erected, or established as a monument?
• Who built it or opened it to the public?
• Why is it interesting or special? Why would people want to visit it?

3. Look at these examples of a tourism website. What language is used to attract tourists?  Can you find examples of passive constructions?

Crater of Diamonds State Park
Crater of Diamonds – History

Try to find the following words on the first page:

abundance
unique
explore, enjoy
all colors of the rainbow
delight
well preserved
diversity
interesting
thrill

4. Using the information from the questions above, write one paragraph about the attraction.

• You should write in the style of a tourism advertisement or brochure.
• You should use at least three sentences with passive construction, using passives with “by” and passives without “by.”
• Type the paragraph in a Word document.
• Give your paragraph an attractive title!

5. Find one or more photographs of the attraction. If you took the photographs, that is great! If not, try to find a photo that is not copyrighted. Add the photo(s) to the document with your paragraph.

Try to make it look nice! You want to attract people to visit your attraction.

6. Save your Word document as a Word 97-2003 (.doc) document (not .docx) and email it to Shayna or print it out and give it to Shayna.

Here is an example of a paragraph for this assignment:

(photo from arkansas.com)

Find your own diamonds!

Crater of Diamonds State Park is the only place in the country where you can dig for your own diamonds, and it is located in Arkansas! The first diamonds in the area were discovered in 1906 by John Wesley Huddleston. For awhile, the land was run as a private tourist attraction, and it was purchased by the State of Arkansas in 1972 . Today, it is a unique place to visit for the excitement of digging for precious stones. In 2006, a six-carat diamond was discovered in the park!

Intermediate: pre-writing example

Here is an example of the pre-writing (thinking of ideas, planning) for a five-paragraph essay. Your homework for Thursday is to do the pre-writing for an essay.

Topic: Advantages of Owning a Pet

Brainstorming: Pets

• Dogs
• Cats
• Fish
• Birds
• Mice
• Fun
• Play
• Helpers
• Do work
• Feed them
• Exercise
• Good health
• Love,  family

Planning (outline)

Paragraph #

1. Introduction: Pets can be good for people.
2. Support: many kinds to choose from
3. Support: fun, pleasure
4. Support: help, health
5. Conclusion: More people should have pets.

Intermediate: Lab 4 (Short story skits)

Group project for “The Ransom of Red Chief”

In class, we read the short story “The Ransom of Red Chief” by O. Henry. (http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/redchief.html) For this lab, you will work with a group to prepare a skit (very short play) about the story.

What should your skit be about?

You have two choices:

-        Imagine a different ending for the story.

-        Imagine what will happen the next day after the end of the story. (This could be in the town of Summit, in the Driscoll house, or wherever Bill and the narrator have gone.)

What are the requirements for the skit?

• 3 to 5 minutes long
• every group member must have a speaking part
• story should be related to “The Ransom of Red Chief”
• at least one character in your skit should be from O. Henry’s story
• reading lines is okay, but you should act out the skit

How should you prepare?

With your group…

• Decide the topic of your skit. What will happen?
• Work together to write the new part of the story. You should write lines for everyone in your group to speak.
• Practice your skit together. You may want to practice your part at home, too.
• You will have some time in class to prepare, but you might need to work or meet outside of class also.
• Perform the skit in class on Friday, June 26.

If you don’t know what a “skit” is, here is an example on YouTube of an ESL class skit.

Movies for listening practice

For English listening practice using radio and podcasts, go to this post.

In addition, here are some movies with language that should be fairly easy to listen to.

I have checked the DVDs of these movies. They all have either closed captioning or English subtitles. (Closed captioning can be accessed through your televion. To turn on subtitles, use the DVD menu language options.)

You should be able to rent most of these movies at a local video rental store, or buy them online at places like Amazon.com or Deepdiscount.com. You can find information about these movies by looking them up in the Internet Movie Database.

Animated films:

• Wall-E
• Toy Story
• The Iron Giant
• Monster House
• Antz

Live action dramas:

• Titanic
• E.T.
• The Karate Kid
• Rudy
• Secondhand Lions
• Kit Kittredge: An American Girl

Documentaries (nonfiction):

• Encounters at the End of the World – about exploring Antarctica
• Animals Are Beautiful People – 1975 film about African animals
• Secret Yellowstone – about the U.S. national park
• March of the Penguins
• Space Station: IMAX

If you use one of these movies to practice your English listening, I would like to know your opinion!

• Was it easy to listen to?
• Did the captions or subtitles work?
• Was the movie interesting to you?
• Would you recommend the movie for other ESL students? Why or why not?
• Would you recommend a different movie?

Foundations: Lab 3 (Demonstration)

Due June 19

In this lab, you will demonstrate an ability. You should come to class Friday ready to demonstrate something you can do.

In 5 minutes or less, you will show us your skill or talent.

• We can go outside if necessary (weather permitting).
• You must bring all equipment or objects you need.
• After your demonstration, you should describe your ability. Use these sentences (and more, if you want):

I can…

I learned to … (time or age) …

To learn to …, you need to …

Example:

“I can play the clarinet.”

“I learned to play when I was 11 years old.”

“To learn to play the clarinet, you need to have a teacher and practice a lot! You also have to move your fingers fast and have a strong mouth.”

Examples of skills and abilities:

“I can…”

• draw
• dance
• play the (instrument)
• head a soccer ball, dribble a basketball, catch a pop fly (any skill necessary for a sport)
• tie my shoes
• make a sandwich
• tie a necktie
• braid hair