Warming up for Unit 3

- Revision Unit 1: verbs/adjectives with prepositions, passives, perfect aspect (photocopy)

- Introduction UNIT 3: ‘Tales’- analysing your partner’s personality with “A walk in the woods”.
Useful vocabulary: woods, to wave, bunch of keys, pick up, old wooden chest.

- Listening & Speaking: What do you know about Agatha Christie?

Homework (22-10-08)

Prefixes (p.15)

1.3. Burning ambitions

- Listening, Speaking & Writing: working on radio news bulletin and practising passive structures! (p. 11 .... still from 1.2. Famous Firsts)


- Reading (p.12) & Listening (p.14). We considered questions such as:

• Who generally does it better: women, men or both? (It= cooking, gardening, tolerating pain, listening to other people, ballet, expressing emotions, looking after children)
• Do you think women have limited opportunities in the world of sport?
• Do you think sport or dance could help reduce levels of delinquency in teenagers and young people?

- Grammar: perfect aspect (p.14)

Future perfect: 'I'll have been here for three months'
Present perfect: 'I've studied English for three years'
Past perfect: 'I had never done anything like that'

Homework (17-10-08)

Composition: 'It looked like a quiet night but...'
Grammar worksheet: 'Passives'
Workbook: pp. 4-7
More grammar practice: Advanced Language Learning - 6 & 7

1.2. Famous firsts

- Expressions to say how much you know / don't know about something:
(-) I haven't a clue, I've never heard of him, I know next to nothing, I haven't the faintest idea
(+) I know it inside out, I know it like the back of my hand

- Listening & Speaking: "Who did it first?" - how much do you know about inventors? (p. 10)

- Grammar: Passive constructions (p.10) used when we want to distance ourselves from specific information or when we are not sure about the information source.

• If + passive + that clause (It is said that... / It is believed that...)
• Subject + passive + to (infinitive - present reference) / to (have + past participle - past reference)

- Grammar Practice: activities 8, 9, 10 (p.11)

1.1. Learning languages

Activity 1 # Reading and comment on learning languages (p.6)

Activity 2 # Useful vocabulary and Listening (p.7)

Activity 3 # Advertising the best language course in class!!

Activity 4 # Verbs/Adjectives with prepositions (p.8)

Unit 1. Challenges.

Is mountain climbing a challenge for you? If it is so, would it be an achievable goal or just a daunting challenge?

Activity 1 # Phrases and Expressions to talk about challenges (p.5)

Activity 2 # Listening and Speaking "Everest" (video shown in class) - Useful vocabulary: ice axe, crampons, ropes, harnesses, climbing helmet, base camp and camp, expedition, sickness symptoms, summit, blizzard.

Course Introduction

Activity 1 # "Letter to the class": an informal letter to introduce each other.
Activity 2 # "Find out about me" helped us know a bit more about each other.
Activity 3 # Cloze "Elizabeth I: An Overview" ... to start getting into grammar intricacies.