LESSON PLAN

Cristina Rusu

Grade: 10th, bilingual English class; 15 students, 13 girls and 2 boys; advanced level. We have been working together for one and a half years. The class takes place on a Friday, at 10 o’clock. The students are extremely enthusiastic and used to working in pairs or groups on communicative tasks.

Recent work on literature: the students have studied Oliver Twist, Dead Poets Society, Harry Potter, Romeo and Juliet.

Textbook: Upstream Upper-Intermediate

Unit 7- His-tory

Topic: history; historical figures

Topics

Themes

Personal area

Interpersonal relationships

 Lifestyle in the English-speaking world

Public area

Democracy and human rights 

Educational area

Cultural life

Aspects of the target country’s culture and civiliz-ation

Past and present linguistic aspects

Good vs. evil

Relationships

Type of lesson: Integrating skills; lesson centered on student interaction based on the issues presented in Dickens’ book and on the historical aspects of the period.

Skills:

• Speaking and vocabulary development

• Listening for global meaning and detailed comprehension

Aims: (At the end of the lesson, the students will be able)

• To organize ideas in a logical, structured way• To raise expectations and create involvement in the tasks• To comment on given stimuli• To listen to a performance and assess it based on prior knowledge and

an assessment scheme• To listen for specific information/ for global meaning• To transmit information in a structured way• To identify meanings from context• To discuss problems and find solutions• To use language of argumentation, giving/ asking for opinion• To give students the chance to debate on and discuss a certain given

topic• To give students the opportunity for free choice of vocabulary and argu-

ments• To give students the freedom to interpret ideas in context• 1.1. Identify

the global meaning of a text • To identify details in written or oral texts• To compare and contrast two or more different texts/ a text and a real-life

occurrence based on the selection of relevant information from the read-ing/ listening material

• To identify different viewpoints and opinions in order to set them against the personal point of view

• To set the events identified in a text etc against a daily occurrence and compare them

• To report on a group activity/ project• To provide feedback for a group presentation/ project• To provide the summary of a text/ fragment/ film/ play in writing/ viva

voce• To present plot, character, setting, ideas and symbols identified in a liter-

ary text/ film/ play and express personal views in relation to them• To research a topic and, by synthesis and analysis, put together a

presentation• To write/ present/ perform plays/ essays/ poems on a given topic or fol-

lowing a certain story line• To respond to opinions• To provide feedback for a debate or discussion• To sustain a personal point of view regarding an idea/ topic• To argue for and against a given topic/ situation/ course of action

• To debate on a given topic• To work out meaning and pronunciation from the context

Stages Teacher’s activity Students’ activity Type of activ-ity

Class organization: 3 minutes

The teacher organizes the realia and aids with the help of the students. The teacher also tells the students what today’s lesson will be about.

Class manage-ment activity

Lead- in5 minutes

The teacher asks the students what can be learned about history from literary sources and movies, as well as to give some examples of movies/ works that teach people about history.

The students work in pairs on this question and then give the teacher feedback with examples.

Pair workWhole-class feedback

Preparing student interaction2 minutes

The teacher tells the students that they will be discussing the Vic-torian Age and subsequently re-membering Charles Dickens. The teacher asks the students what they know about Victorian Britain.

The students provide information about the period. They are then told that they will be shown a number of short videos about Victorianism and Dickens and they should make brief notes about what they see.

Whole-class activity

Listening for global meaning- 13- 15 minutes

5 minutes: The teacher plays the first video (Life in Victorian Bri-tain) and asks the students to focus on the corresponding questions in handout 1..5 minutes: The teacher plays videos 2 and 3 and asks the students to fo-cus on the corresponding questions in the handout. 3 minutes: the teacher now plays the trailer of the Oliver Twist movie, so that the students remem-ber it.

The students complete the task and then share the information they have heard with a partner.

The students will identify the issue of workhouses, child labor and orphan-ages as being the ones presented in Oliver Twist.

Whole-classPair work

Post-listening:5 minutes

Teacher and students together have a discussion about the story of Oliver Twist, based on the few questions from the end of handout 4.

Whole-class activity

Vocabulary focus: 7 minutes

The teacher gives the students handout no.2 and allows them 5 minutes to work with their partners on it, then asks them to transform those events into third type if clauses.

The students find the consequences of the events listed in the handout and subsequently work on conditionals type 3 based on them.

Group work and whole-class feedback

Production: play performance: 13 minutes

The students had to prepare a short play on one of the topics in Oliver Twist. The teacher will ask the group that worked on the problem of orphanages to perform their play and gives the rest of the students an as-sessment form to fill in during the play (handout 3), which will then be discussed by the entire group.

Whole-class activity

Homework: work on the quiz from handout 4.

Teaching techniques:

Listening for specific and detailed information and global meaning

Argumentative speech

Discussion and debate

Brainstorming

Elicitation

Aids/ materials:

Whiteboard

Laptop

Video-projector

Handouts

I expect that the following might be a problem:

Managing to do all the proposed activities in 50 minutes. In case we do not get to discuss the feedback form, we will do this at the beginning of the next class.

Handout 1- video-based questionnaire

Video 1:

A. What are three of the opinions about the Victorian age? Fill-in the gaps:

• Some find ………………………………, po-faced1 …………………….. faintly amusing.2

• Others, including ……………………………………………………………., be-lieve that Victorian values are something ……………………………………………………….. .

• Many remember a society when ……………….. ………………… and ………………………… stood in stark contrast with …………………………… and …………………………… ………………………. .

B. What did, however, happen in the period to which Queen Victoria gave her name?

• ..........................................

• Great advances in …………………………, …………………………… and ……………………..

• Some attempt to …………………………………………………………………………

• What examples of geniuses are given?

o ……………………………….

o ……………………………….

o ……………………………….

o ……………………………….

What do you know about them?

• How does the speaker call the army? …………………………………………………

Video 2

1 wearing a disapproving, stern expression

2 prude: someone who is excessively concerned with being or appearing to be proper, modest, or righteous

• How was England at the beginning of the 19th century? ___________________

• How was village life back then?_____________________________________

• How long did it take for this to change? ______________________________

• What appeared new? ______________________________________________

• What kind of society was created as a result?_________________________

• What happened to villages? ______________________

• What was England turned into (from an agricultural society)? ______________

• ___________________

• What did Mr. Charles Dickens see in the industrial revolution? ______________

• Whose point of view did he adopt in his books? __________________________

• What were the things that he portrayed? _________________________

• What did he immortalize in Oliver Twist? _____________________________

Video 3 (BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!)

When did Charles Dickens live? ……………………………………………….

What scenes did you recognize from the video? ……………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

What is the general opinion on the writer? ……………………………………………………………………………….

How does he seem from his photos? ………………………………………………………………………………………

Handout 2

A. Oliver’s mother died. Can you identify three consequences?

1. __________________________________________________________

2. __________________________________________________________

3. __________________________________________________________

B. Oliver met the Artful Dodger on his arrival in London. Identify three consequences.

1. __________________________________________________________

2. __________________________________________________________

3. __________________________________________________________

Handout 3 -feedback form for plays

Evaluation criteria Score Observations

Stage movement and choreography

2. General acting and team work

3. Suggestiveness of setting

4. Musical background

5. Creativity and ingenuity in the use of re-sources, costumes, props

6. Correctness and naturalness of English lan-guage

7. Natural pace of action and dialogue

8. Best use of the stage space

9. Convincing interpretation of characters

10. Direction

Each criterion will score a maximum of 10 points, so that the maximum score will

be 100 points.

Handout 4

Who runs the home for young orphans where Oliver lives for nine years?

(A) Mr. Bumble(B) Mrs. Mann(C) Agnes Fleming(D) Miss Hannigan

How does Oliver violate the rules of the work-house?

(A) By asking for more gruel(B) By taking the Lord’s name in vain(C) By running a pickpocketing ring(D) By spreading revolutionary ideology among the paupers

What is Mr. Gamfield’s profession?

(A) Undertaker(B) Chef(C) Butler(D) Chimney sweep

What is Mr. Sowerberry’s profession?

(A) Undertaker(B) Chef(C) Butler(D) Chimney sweep

How does Noah Claypole incur Oliver’s wrath?

(A) By insulting his mother(B) By insulting his clothes(C) By mistreating Charlotte(D) By stealing food from the larder

What is Jack Dawkins’s nickname?

(A) Toby Crackit(B) The Artful Dodger(C) Loopy(D) The Jackal

Of what ethnicity is Fagin?

(A) Irish(B) Italian(C) Mixed race(D) Jewish

Mr. Brownlow notices that Oliver bears a close re-semblance to whom?

(A) Mrs. Bedwin(B) The woman in the portrait on his wall(C) Queen Victoria(D) The Christ child

What does Nancy pretend to be in order to drag Oliver back to Fagin?

(A) A truant officer(B) Oliver’s sister(C) A workhouse official(D) Oliver’s mother

Who is shot in the attempted burglary of the Maylie house?

(A) Oliver(B) Bill Sikes(C) Bull’s-eye(D) Toby Crackit

Who comes to Oliver’s defense after Fagin recap-tures him?

(A) Jack Dawkins(B) Charley Bates(C) Nancy(D) Mr. Brownlow

Which character falls deathly ill in the countryside?

(A) Oliver(B) Mrs. Maylie(C) Mr. Bumble(D) Rose Maylie

To whom does the dog Bull’s-eye belong?

(A) Bill Sikes(B) Oliver(C) Monks(D) Mr. Brownlow

What did Old Sally steal from Agnes Fleming?

(A) A will(B) A marriage certificate(C) An engraved watch(D) A gold locket

What is Nancy’s profession?

(A) Flower-seller(B) Nurse(C) Prostitute(D) Con artist

Where does Nancy meet Brownlow?

(A) London Bridge(B) The Three Cripples(C) The Old Victoria Theater(D) A blacking factory

Where does Oliver last see Fagin?

(A) In a courtroom(B) In the West Indies(C) Underneath London Bridge(D) In a jail cell

Dickens wrote Oliver Twist in response to what piece of legislation?

(A) The Law of Estates and Inheritance(B) The Poor Law of 1834(C) The institution of the death penalty(D) The Decency Act

Discuss the following themes as they appear in the book:

• The countryside versus the city

• Purity

• Identity

• Relationships