Russell Stannard has some news for us.
In this issue, I should like to look at news articles which are available on the web, and activities which enable them to be used in class. There are plenty of news websites out there and some do a lot of the work for you. Here are just three of them.
If you are looking for complete lesson plans, then this site is definitely worth looking at. So much so, that a more in-depth review of it can be found on page 44. Each day a different piece of news is dealt with at two levels called ‘easier’ and ‘harder’. A complete worksheet is included, with more than enough exercises, discussions, groupwork and pairwork ideas to fill a whole lesson and more. This is a real time-saver!
This website has a lot of recorded news items with the texts provided so that they can be read as well as listened to. This can be great for setting homework – get the students to listen and read a story for their next lesson. The articles are read at a slightly slower pace than normal.
This learning network of the New York Times has a selection of articles, and each comes with its own lesson plan. The plans look extensive and are very detailed, but you can select what you want to use in class.
One thing I have done in higher-level classes is to put five or six headlines on the walls around the classroom with a table and one large piece of paper below each headline. I then put the students into groups (three or four per group) and get each group to go to a different headline. The students have to read the headline and write down any ideas they have about what the story might be, working from the headline itself. They leave these notes on the paper beneath the headline. Some of the groups have lots of ideas as they already know their story and other groups struggle because they know nothing about it and have to guess what it might be about. To overcome this problem, I give them only one minute with the headline and then make them move on to another headline. Again, they read the headline, then read the notes previous groups have made about the headline and then add their own. At the end, all the groups have seen all the headlines and each headline has one piece of paper with lots of notes and ideas. I then give each group one set of notes and ideas and ask them to write a short summary of what their headline is about. One person from each group is asked to read out their summary. Finally I put up two copies of each article under its headline. The students go and read the article that they have written a summary of. After that, they sit down and discuss the differences between their version and the original.
Pick headlines that are not too obscure so that the students have a good idea what the story might be about. Get all the members of the group to write out the summary
A nice idea is to start a lesson by telling the students about some things that happened in the past on that particular day. I have seen a couple of teachers doing this and I have tried to do it myself. (It is quite time-consuming as you have to gather the information each day, so it works really well if you have three or four lessons on the same day and can use the information more than once!) For example, on the day that I am writing this, in 1945 50 nations signed the charter for the United Nations. In 1948 the Berlin Airlift began today. Colonel Tom Parker (Elvis Presley’s manager) was born on this day, as were Mick Jagger and Brian Taylor of Queen
You can find lists of people born on a certain day at: www.scopesys.com/cgi-bin/today2.cgi
Other sites for ‘on this day in history’ information are: www.on-this-day.com/ www.infoplease.com/dayinhistory www.historychannel.com/today/
This idea is good for skimming and scanning work. Put seven or eight short articles on the wall, without their headlines. Make sure the articles are numbered. Put the students into pairs and give each pair a photocopy of the eight headlines (ie one for each story that is on the wall). Now tell the students that they have to go around the class, quickly read the articles and then go back and write the number of the article under the correct headline. Tell them that the best way is for both the students to read the same article and then make sure they agree. Finally see how much the students can remember about the articles. As a class see if they can retell the stories behind each headline, or give out a questionnaire about the articles and see if the students can answer the questions. If they don’t know an answer, they should go back to the relevant article on the wall and find it.
Use articles from websites aimed at language learners as the language will have been simplified. You need about half as many articles as there are students (or put up two photocopies of each article). You can’t have more than one pair of students reading an article on the wall at any time. Keep the articles and put them in plastic sheets so that you can use them again.
Russell Stannard is a senior lecturer in ICT and course leader for MSc Multimedia at the University of Westminster, UK. He has an extensive publishing background in ELT and is currently working with BBC Worldwide on various CD-ROMs, and with Macmillan Hong Kong on a primary course. He also teaches English and Spanish at Sutton Adult Education College, UK.
This article first appeared in English Teaching Professional, Issue 40, 2006