Where should I live?
By the end of the lesson, sts will have practised reading for gist, scanning and reading for detail and practiced their speaking skills (fluency) while describing pictures of living rooms .
To practise prepositions of place and language for describing a room within the context of talking about different living rooms.
Procedure (40-56 minutes)
Sts watch a short video (first 2 mins) of a tour of a house. As they watch they have to write down the furniture and the different rooms they see. (Pause the video). WC FB to get an idea of some of the things they saw. (last 1.30 mins) Ask the following questions: Is the house light or dark? Are the rooms spacious or crowded? Are the rooms big or small? What colour are the walls? T will teach any unknown vocab from these questions using the video. Some of this language will be used later in the lesson.
T says: Do you like the house? I like this house but it’s very expensive. I haven’t got enough money to buy it. Maybe I can pay money every month for it. Teach the difference between ‘buy’ a house and ‘rent’ a house. CCQs to check ‘I rent my house’: Is it my house? NO Is it someone else’s house? YES Do I pay for it? YES I want to rent a house. Show adverts for flats/houses. Where do I see these adverts? Elicit: in a newspaper, on the Internet. Show pictures of people. All these people want to rent a new house in Dublin. Where’s that? In Ireland.
Set reading task: Look at the texts about 4 different places to live. Quickly read the texts to find the answers to the questions. When giving question sheet, emphasise that sts MUSTN’T unfold the paper. Get sts to understand how to do the scanning task by doing an example together. What’s the 1st question? Important information is HOW MUCH and FIRHOUSE? What about the 2nd question? HOW MANY BEDROOMS and CASTLEKNOCK. First read the questions and underline all the important words. Sts do this and T monitors. Then give reading texts and a 3 minute time limit. Pre-teach ‘place’. Peer check, then check answers from key.
T says: Remember these people. Who are they? We’re going to try to find a good place for them to rent. First, we need to find out who they are and what they want. Set gist task: Quickly read the texts and match the people to the pictures. Give a 30 second time limit. Peer check and quick WC FB.
T says: Read the texts again. You can read more carefully this time. Think about which house or flat is best for Harry & Beth, Gary & Katy and Michael. After reading sts discuss their ideas using: I think (A, B, C, D) is best for (name) because........ Get some FB.
Now we know which house or flat the different people want. What do they next? They want to see the house. Who helps them with this? Elicit/teach: estate agent (drill and board – use picture to teach meaning). They call the estate agent but she has a problem today and she can’t leave the office. For all the people the living room is the most important room. They want to know what it is like. The estate agent sends them an email of the living room photos. Let’s look at the pictures of the living rooms in the different houses. (Show pictures on PPT). Set task: Each table will get one living room photo. Look at the photo and talk about it with your partners. Give photo with prompts HO. Sts talk about the pictures using the prompts. Encourage them to use: There is / are....,and prepositions of place. T monitors and takes notes of good language and mistakes (to be used in the final stage).
T says: The estate agent is really having problems today. She has pictures of the different living rooms but she can’t remember which one is for which house. We need to help her. You will tell each other about your picture. You will listen and take notes. Give an example: I’m A. I say: My living room is crowded and light. The walls are white. It’s a big room. There is a sofa and two armchairs... Show sts how to fill in their grids. When A has finished, then B explains and so on. Don’t say name of house. Sts do task. T monitors and notes examples of good language and errors. After all the sts have shared their info, they will go to the walls where all 4 pictures will be with the correct house name. They will look and write the name of each house with the correct information. Peer check. While the sts are doing that, T writes examples of their language on the WB (using Word on laptop).