http://www.cnn.com/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
The topic of unit 6 is the news. It’s nice to keep this fresh and up-to-date, something which can now be done with the Internet. There are a number of different activities which you can do using these or other related sites. Firstly, ask your students what’s in the news now, brainstorm both the headline and some details, then check out these sites to see what’s said. Alternatively, pick a story and see how the two broadcasters, one American and one British, deal with the same piece of news (you have the added bonus that both links also have sound).
http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk
http://www.express.co.uk/
http://www.mirror.co.uk/
Unit 6 also takes a look at the world of tabloid press. Do your students really understand the differences between the so-called ‘Quality’ press and the Tabloids? Why not use the sites above to compare both content and style of reporting. Pages 54 and 55 focus on headlines, here you have a continually updated bank of ‘real’ headlines. Give students a selection of headlines from the day's papers and get them to predict the story, then check their predictions here.
Unit 7
http://www.historychannel.com/
The theme in unit 7 is Parties. Halloween is one of the most widely celebrated ‘parties’ in Britain and other English-speaking countries. This site contains a history of the origins as well as information about the traditions from around the world.
http://www.cyberspain.com/life/fallas.htm
Information in English on Las Fallas, which is the focus of page 58. Set your students some reading comprehension questions and then direct them to this site. Then ask them to go to http://www.cyberspain.com/life/sanfer.htm and have a look at the information about the San Fermin festival in Pamplona, another very famous festival. Finally, they could write some questions of their own and design a quiz for the other students.
Unit 9
http://www.bbc.co.uk/eastenders/
Much of unit 9 focuses on Pacific Heights, an American soap opera. To give your students a taste of British soap why not visit the official site of Eastenders, one of Britain's most popular soap operas. Read up on the storylines, the characters and features on this BBC site. Get your students to create their very own Eastenders stories using the characters past and present and create a ‘soap box corner’ in the classroom. Take it one step further and send in your ideas to the BBC – you never know!
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/world/9901/beyond-2000/
The other topic touched upon in this unit is predictions for the future. On page 80 students look at predictions about family life and three uses of the modal verb will. Take this topic a step further by getting your students to make three predictions regarding technological advances. They can then compare their predictions with the ones on this site. Click on the subjects on the right to look at National Geographic World’s best guesses about technological developments in our lifetime - and beyond. Finally, debate the pros and cons of topics such as technological advances, predictions and family life.
Unit 10
http://www.quia.com/jg/28284.html
Activities to practise idioms and expressions of time. Both fun and educational, well worth a visit.
Links nicely with the first half of the unit.
http://www.manythings.org/proverbs/proverbs14.html
Try the online activity. Then have a closer look at the proverbs which refer to time – what do they mean? You could also get your students to try and use the proverbs appropriately by getting them to write a short dialogue, in pairs, where they incorporate two or three of the proverbs on the webpage.
