This is the third in a series of posts based around the graphic novel Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi. I am reading through the book with several groups of ESL students. Each week we go over new vocabulary that arises and have a short discussion based on any issues that come up.
Vocabulary
There are several vocab points that came up from this chapter:
a putsch = a coup
to overthrow = to remove a government from power
proof = noun from verb “to prove”
westerner = person from the west, also northerner, southerner, easterner.
illiterate = someone who cannot read or write
vast = very big
nevertheless = 1 use as a contrast linker like “however” or another use is as a synonym of “anyway”
entourage = group of people who accompany and support a person
the rabble = a disorganised group of people, here referring to the workers
to rule = to govern
to be sidetracked = to be distracted or prevented from doing something
wrinkled = with fold lines
Discussion Questions
What happened in this chapter?
What was your reaction to it?
What new information do we learn in this chapter?
How aware were people of British involvement in regime change at the time?
Were your country’s government involved in anything similar?
Do you think this type of interference still happens today?
How have the tactics and strategies changed?
On the opening page we see the police’s heavy-handed response to the demonstrations, are the police heavy-handed in your country? What was the governments reaction to the last big demonstration in your country?
First put “The University of Life” on the board and ask the students what they think it means. Have the flashcards cut up. Put students in small groups (3-4) and give them the flashcards one at a time. Encourage them to discuss the following for each card:
What have you learnt from this life experience? If you haven’t had this experience, speculate about what you could learn from it.
Once they have discussed all the flashcards tell students to think of 2 more life experiences that have taught them a lot. They should then share them with the rest of the class.
Tell students to try and put the life experiences in order to value in terms of experience and self improvement gained.
Now tell students to think about the ways in which each of the life experiences are viewed by potential employers. Encourage them to think of both good and bad interpretations. For example with travelling a potential employer could think that you are more open-minded and have a better understanding of different cultures. On the other hand, they might think that you only want the job to save money for another trip.
A possible homework assignment based around this topic could be a short composition in which students explain what they have learnt from one of the life experiences in the list.
This is a conversation class for adults or mature teens based around the horse meat scandal currently rocking Europe. To download the handout click here:
Split the class into small groups (3-4) and give out the handout. Students discuss the questions and then feed back to the rest of the class. Some vocabulary might need to be pre-taught, for example “a nanny-state”. Here are the questions from the handout.
What do you know about the horse meat scandal? Share your knowledge with your group.
Do you think it has affected you? Have you eaten any ready meals recently? Or Ikea meat balls?
Does the story surprise you?
How long do you think it has been going on?
“In France horse is a delicacy, I don’t understand all the fuss.” What do you think of this statement?
Are there any types of food you avoid because you are worried about the quality of the ingredients? Sausages, hamburgers, kebabs etc.
How closely do you monitor the food you eat? Do you read the ingredients on the packets? Do you count calories?
Do you think ingredients should be displayed in a different way? A traffic light system for example.
Whose responsibility is it to ensure that scandals like this don’t happen?
“I don’t care what’s in it as long as it tastes good.” How far do you agree with this statement? Do you think most people agree or disagree with this statement?
Do you think that your country has a “nanny state”? (a government that interferes too much in the way you live your life)
What elements of people’s lifestyle should be controlled by the state? If any.
In this part students are required to speak for 2 minutes about a given subject. They will be given a card with a question and 3 bullet points of suggested areas to focus on. Students are required to stay on topic for the 2 minutes but they DO NOT have to cover the bullet points, they are just a guide.
There are 10 examples of genuine long turn questions taken from various handbooks and passed papers on the powerpoint above. What I like to do is set “ambush” long turns; have the powerpoint set up and after finishing a different class activity suddenly put up a question and instruct students to begin talking immediately.
For these practices you should have students sit in pairs. Each pair should have a timer of some kind. Remind students that they need to talk for 2 minutes without interruptions. Ensure that the student who is not taking their long turn hides the timer from the view of the speaking student; in the exam they will not know how long they’ve been speaking for and they must get used to structuring their turn to last the allotted time.
Before starting the practices go through the class handout. The handout is just a guide with some ideas about how to structure a long turn. My main focus in writing the handout was to encourage my students to personalise the question and also to link it to current affairs. After each practice turn encourage students to share the ways in which they personalised each question and any links to current affairs they found.
Here is the handout:
Speaking Long Turn
Talk for 2 minutes without interruption about a subject with 3 pointers to guide you.
How important is sport in today’s society?
Entertainment
Health
Different stages of life
Tips
You will only have a few seconds to gather your thoughts before you start talking. Try to think of your turn as introduction, body, and conclusion.
Start with a time buyer:
It’s funny you should ask that…………..
That’s weird I was just talking about this the other day…………….
Hhhmmmm that’s a tough one………….
That’s an interesting question………………
Now let me see…………………..
Immediately personalise the topic
Generally people find it easiest to talk about themselves and their own experiences rather than speak objectively about something. Speaking about personal experience is also more engaging for the listener.
For me personally sport isn’t that important.
As far as I’m concerned sport is a big part of my life.
Speaking from personal experience I’d say
Using your experience as a starting point you can then link into more general discussion of the topic. Think of it like the exciting first paragraph of an article.
Link the topic to current affairs
Normally there’s a link between the topic and something happening in the world at the current time.
Take Barça for example, the loss to Madrid clearly affected the whole city.
We only have to look at the doping scandals involving Lance Armstrong……
Wrap up
Try and recap everything you’ve said and tie it all together
Need help getting teenage students to produce compositions? Why not try this great warm up game from my friend Magistra Monson. The idea is you take clippings from real news stories and use them as a jumping off point for creative or argumentative writing. The class works as a team adding a paragraph each to the story with hilarious consequences. Definitely an idea I’m gonna use in my next teen class, or even with adults. You can download different introductory paragraphs from Magistra’s blog.
This has actually helped inspire a pipe dream I have for a new blog based around crowd sourced short stories. The working title at the moment is “Crowd Shorts” watch this space………………………. and pay attention to big Steve, that guys knows his onions.
This is the second part in a series of posts based around the graphic novel “Persepolis” by Marjane Satrapi. I’m currently working through the book with three separate groups of adults with a level ranging from A2 – C1 and one teenage individual with a C1 level. Each week I set the next chapter of the book as homework and we dedicate the first 15-20 minutes of each class to vocabulary and grammar issues that arise and a discussion of the various issues that come up.
Chapter 2, The Bicycle
Here is some of vocabulary that came up in class:
to awake
a synonym of “to wake up” but used for more poetic writing, or in older texts. Note that there are irregular conjugations of the verb = awake, awoke, awoken but also regular ones: awake, awakened.
To blame something ON somebody.
The shah blames the fire on the fanatics.
pronunciation of Iran and use of different regional adjectives: Iranian, Middle-Eastern, Western etc.
unshakeable
The collocation unshakeable faith, an indestructible faith. Also verb “to shake” – shake shook shaken. (James Bond Reference)
forbid forbade forbidden
In reference to the police stopping people from rescuing the people trapped in the burning cinema.
fickle
a good adjective to teach students to describe Marji, in the last chapter she wanted to be a prophet and was obsessed with religion and now in this one she wants to be a revolutionary like Fidel Castro or Che Guevara. Fickle describes a person who changes their loyalties and tastes very easily and often.
Discussion questions
What happens in this chapter?
How does Marji’s attitude change?
Who does she idolise? Is she fickle?
How does the novel portray the Rex cinema fire? (one of the worst terrorist attacks of modern times, read the wiki here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinema_Rex_fire)
What do you think of the way Marji’s parents are raising / educating her? (with Descartes, Marx etc.)
Do you think that children today study reliable history of these events?
If you are old enough to remember the Iranian revolution, what do you remember? How was it perceived in your country?
Do you remember where you were and what you were doing at the time of a big atrocity? (in reference to the Rex fire, possiblities could be 9/11, the London bombing, the Madrid bombing etc.)
Homework
Set chapter 3 entitled “The Water Cell” for students to read for next class.
For each class I am making a set of vocabulary flashcards on the website http://www.quizlet.com so that at the start of each class we can briefly revise vocab from the week before.
Before you use these materials, why not check out our new podcast for learners and teachers alike? It’s called 2Ts in a Pod, have a listen here:
This lesson plan is a conversation class where adult students talk about their childhood, career path and work history. It is suitable for levels B1-C1.
Brainstorm jobs, put students in pairs or small groups and give them 5 minutes to write as many different jobs as they can. Tell them that you’ll award them 1 point for each job that another group has also come up with but 2 points for a unique job that nobody else thought of.
Go through jobs and put them on the board.
Tell students they are going to watch a film called “when I grow up”. They have to make predictions about what’s going to happen in the film. Go through predictions and put them on the board.
Tell them to watch the film and try and note as many jobs as they can from it. (there are a lot!)
Show the film:
Film discussion
Put students in small groups to discuss the following questions:
What’s the film about?
What’s the message of the film?
Do you think it accurately represents the pressures on children nowadays?
Students discuss the following questions in small groups:
How did you decide which job you wanted to do?
How did you get your job?
What did you want to be when you were a child? Did you get that job?
Who influenced your career choices the most?
Did you have a careers advisor at school?
If so, what did they tell you?
Was your career choice influenced by the grades you got at school?
Have you made any big career changes in your life? Would you like to?
What was your position when you joined your current company / workplace?
Have you ever been promoted?
Have you ever been headhunted?
Do you work in a management role? Would you like to work in one?
What’s more important for your job, your experience or your qualifications?
If you have children would you ever dissuade them from choosing a particular career?
Musician
Actor
Journalist
Dancer
Doctor
All groups feedback to the class.
Interview Roleplay
What’s more important work experience or life experience?
Students are going to do a job interview roleplay. This works best with groups of 4, 2 interviewers and 2 candidates.
Give out role cards and give interviewers a minute to think of the job that the interview is for. When they have decided give the candidates a minute to invent some relative experience. Interviewers should also come up with some typical difficult interview questions:
Examples:
What can you offer the company?
What are your strengths and weaknesses?
Think of a time when you solved a problem using your own initiative.
Think of a time when youmade a mistake at work, what did you learn from it?
You are 35 years old, you have had the same job in the same company since you were 18. You have to change job because your company has gone bankrupt. You have 17 years of experience doing the job you are going for.
Candidate 2:
You are 35 years old. You have had 12 different jobs over the last 17 years. You only worked to save money to go travelling. Now you want to settle down and start a family. Convince the managers that you are the one for the job.
Interviewers:
You have 2 candidates for a role in your company (you decide the role) one candidate has a lot of work experience and the other has a lot of life experience. Interview them both and make a decision.
This lesson is a short discussion based around “The Toys of Peace” by Saki, a short satirical story about two parents attempts to influence their young boy’s playing habits. For this series of classes I am using short stories from “The Oxford Book of English Short Stories” edited by A. S. Byatt. If you don’t have a copy of the book most of the short stories are available for free online. This particular short story is available here:
As with the other lessons in this series the story is set of homework the previous week. The first 5-10 minutes of the class are spent going over any vocabulary issues. This is then followed by a discussion based on the themes and issues which arise in the story.
The author Hector Hugh Munro is considered to be one of the masters of the short story. Many of his works were published posthumously following his death in World War 1. His wikipedia page may prove useful for the class discussion:
After going through any vocabulary problems (there shouldn’t be many as the story only runs to 5 pages) have the students discuss the following questions, either in small groups or as a whole class:
Discussion: Toys of Peace
What happens in the story?
What was your initial reaction to it?
Describe the characters.
What do you think of the parents attempt to influence their children?
Do you think they are well-meaning? Or deluded?
What toys did you play with as a child?
Did your parents ban anything they thought would have a bad influence on you? Toys? TV shows? Etc.
Do you agree with the expression “boys will be boys”?
Do you think children should play with toy weapons?
Should girls be given typically girly toys? Dolls, makeup etc.
Are there any toys / games / other things that you think are a bad influence on children or young people
Should these things be banned?
The story is an example of satire. What do you think it is satirising?
What satirical programs / writers / magazines etc. do you have in your country?
This is the first of a series of posts based around the graphic novel “Persepolis” by Marjane Satrapi. They are suitable for a wide range of levels (A2 – C2). You will need a copy of the book (or a cheeky pdf).
Each week you set the students a chapter of the book as homework. Each chapter consists of approximately 9 pages and the graphic style makes them easy and quick to read. In graphic novels students are presented with direct speech rather than prose, this helps them to pick up more natural language of expression. Also graphic novels are easier to follow than more traditional stories as much of the story is conveyed by the pictures. This means students are less likely to get lost and give up.
The first 15-20 minutes of the following class will be dedicated to vocabulary issues from the chapter and group discussions based on the themes that arise therein.
First ask students for clarification of any new vocabulary and encourage them to share new vocabulary they have learned at home relating to the chapter.
Chapter 1 discussion questions:
What happened in chapter one?
How did the chapter make you feel?
How would you describe Marji? (Head-strong? Precocious? imaginative?
What themes and issues are introduced?
What are your views on single sex schools?
What are you views on compulsory uniforms of any kind?
Have you ever taken part in a demonstration? When? Where? What was it for / against?
Do you think that public demonstrations and protests work?
Before you use these materials… We’ve created a new podcast aimed at B2+ level English students and teachers alike. You can listen for free at our SoundCloud page below. You can download teacher’s notes to accompany them from our Facebook page or from this blog. All comments and feedback welcome! Give us a like and a share 😉
As the title suggests the focus is on using the conditionals in conversation so start out by telling the class that you don’t want them to write anything down except the bare conditional structure for reference.
Tell them they are going to explore parallel universes in which they made different choices in their lives.
The exercise presents the students with different topics designed to generate past conditional sentences but also conversation. Explain that you don’t just want them to form 1 past conditional sentence from each point, they should explore each point fully in small groups and try to use the structure in a variety of ways: affirmative /negative / interrogative.
Example:
“If I hadn’t gone to the party, I wouldn’t have met my girlfriend because she was only in town for one night.”
“Do you think you would have had the chance to meet her again?”
“It’s possible, but maybe I would have met someone else.”
Note on pronunciation
For higher levels depending on how well they use the structure you can encourage them to use the weak forms:
Woulda / would’ve / wouldn’t ‘ve
If they have trouble with this start out with the contracted “had” in the if clause and slowly introduce the other forms.
Establishing grammar
If I hadn’t gone to the party, I wouldn’t have met my girlfriend. (past result)
Maybe we wouldn’t be together now. (present result)
If I hadn’t studied drama, I probably would have studied literature.
If I had studied business, I would have got a job in an insurance company
I could have
Explain difference between would have and could have
would have = what definitely happened in this parallel universe
could have = what possibilities were available in the parallel universe
If + had/n’t + past participle + would / could + have + past participle.
Conversation Questions
What did you study at school / university? What other options did you have? Explain them to your group.
Do you remember the interview for your job? What would have happened if you hadn’t got it?
If you have a partner how did you meet? How could things have happened differently?
Think of an important exam you passed or failed in the past, how could things have happened differently?
What would you have done this week if you’d had more time? Why?
What would you have done last year if you’d had more money?
Think of a time when someone helped you with something, what would you have done without their help?
Think of a time when you helped someone, what would they have done without your help?
Think of a time when you had an accident, how could things have happened differently?
Think of a time when you or someone you know was in danger, how could things have happened differently?
Think of big decisions you have made in your life related to work / studying / family, how could things have happened differently? How could things be different now?
