Describing Appearances
Pre-Intermediate 2/ CLB 6/7 level
Description
Materials
Main Aims
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To provide clarification and practice of superlatives and comparatives in the context of appearances with the help of reading, writing, listening, speaking and pronunciation practice
Subsidiary Aims
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To provide review and practice of questions used to ask about description of appearance
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To provide review of phrases used with the word "look"
Procedure (225-295 minutes)
- Write the word beautiful on the board and ask them what it means to them - Show pics of beauty pageants and ask them what they think is beautiful in a person - Ask them: how important is physical beauty and what they like and dislike about beauty contests - Show them pic of Wodabe tribe and ask them: what they think of their appearance, who they think they might be and why they are dressed like this. - Now tell them they will be watching a video and they have answer all the questions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuWmb5xQowA&list=RDkV0SeJUczBw&index=3 - Take up answers and ask them to use words to describe them
- Have the 7 paragraphs blown up and placed around the room. - Give them a sheet of paper with: titles for each paragraph, true and false questions and descriptions for vocabulary in the text (Tell them to try to guess the meaning of difficult words from the context) - Put them in groups of 4 and have them walk around and find the correct answers by reading text around the room. Tell them that the first group to finish first wins - Walk around ensuring they aren't cheating from each other - Take up answers
- Ask them to come up to the board and write interesting words they found in the text (add anything else that is anticipated they might find difficult) - Mark word stress, elicit meaning and do pronunciation practice - In their notebooks ask them to write down words from the board and other words that they know that are related to: height, built, skin, eyes, hair, general appearance. (they may refer to their text or use their dictionaries) (show them a table on the board that they can use to organise their words - See if they can give you opposites of some of the words - walk around and have them pronounce any new words you might notice and go over pronunciation of those words with the entire class
- Add the words in the box to the list and do pronunciation practice (stress and number of syllables) and elicit meaning. Ask them to add these words to their list - Show them the 4 pics of the same girl in different outfits - Ask them to use their list and see if they can describe her. - now tell them they will listen and see if they agree with the description given for each picture - Have them complete the activity from memory. Play the tape again and have them check their answers. - go to the listening script and have them underline the describing words used (adjectives) - Ask them if they know other ways these adjective can be used
- Put them in groups of 4. Give them 10 adjectives (choose from the board - ones with positive traits) and 5 minutes to come up with sentences used to describe people in their class. first group to finish first wins - Each group comes and writes their sentences on the board. Have them correct each others' mistakes. Underline the ones that have comparatives and superlatives in them. Ask them why they are used like this. - Ask 2 students to volunteer and write the word "tall" on the board. Ask them to use a sentence to describe the 2 - Highlight that when 2 things are compared we add "-er" to some adjectives - Now call a third student and repeat the same activity. Repeat activity with 4 or 5 students. - Highlight that when 3 or more things are compared we add "- est" to some adjectives - Point out some regular adjectives in their book and ask them to say the comparative and superlative form of them - Now bring their attention to the syllables marked on the board and highlight how we add "-er" and "-est" to words to words with 1 syllable and 2 syllable words ending in "-y" - Now ask them what we would do with words with 2 or more than 2 syllables. Highlight the use of "more" or "the most" before them - Highlight that some irregular forms like "good, "bad", "less", change completely and have them guess the forms. Highlight and have them put them down in their notebooks - Do pronunciation practice of the new words and their forms - Ask them what kind of prepositions can be used for describing. - Let them complete table and take it up
- Ask them to now think of people they know (or the people in class, if they agree) and have them write sentences about them using comparatives and superlatives - Take them up
- Ask them what kind of questions they would ask if they wanted to know about someone's appearance. Write some of them on the board - Give them jumbled questions to work on in pairs - Take it up as a class - Ask them what kind of answers would they give for each question (could give answers about their partners of they agree) - Ask them to match the questions to their answers - Have them look at the picture and describe some of the footballers - Now tell them they will listen and guess which footballer the person on the tape is talking about - Take it up
-Put the class in groups of 4 and hand each group a piece of paper. - Model a bubble diagram on the board and tell them they will be coming up with phrases that have the word look in them, to: seeing something, describing people, trying to find something and other phrasal verbs they might know (they may use their dictionaries for the activity) - once they are done, take them up on the board and add any that they might have missed and go over the meanings - have them complete the 2 exercises and check in pairs - take it up as a class
- Show them a picture of Johnny Depp in the poster. Ask them Who he is, what this is (the poster), whether they have seen the movie. - Ask them what they think the movie is about - Ask them to give you words related to banks and bank robbery - Do syllables, word stress and pronunciation practice - Ask them to look at movie still and fill the blanks in the paragraph by guessing - Have them watch the movie clip and they have to complete the gap and see if they were correct - Now tell them to watch it again and this time imagine that they were in the bank at the time of the robbery. The police will need them to describe the suspects to them - Once they are done watching, hand them the pictures of the "suspects" and have them write words to describe them - Ask them what kind of questions the police might as them about the the appearance of the suspects - Take them up as a class and put them on the board - Put them in pairs and make one the policeman and the other one the witness. Have the witnesses questioned by the police. After 10 minutes have them switch roles. - Walk around and note down mistakes they might make
- Write the mistakes they were making, on the board and have them come one by one to correct them
- Have them write a newspaper report about the crime. They must include: - Where and when it took place - What the police did and who they spoke to - What the witness told the police - Detailed description of the suspects - what is going to happen next - Once they are done, have them correct each other's reports - Take up the mistakes on the board and correct them as a class