Inside Out Web Guides
Pre-intermediate
Unit 9
Dating rules
http://dating1.indiatimes.com/date/rules/#
What are the rules of dating? Unit 9 starts to look at this but doesn’t go into much depth. Before you click on this site split your class into two groups – all the men in one group and all the women in the other. Ask each group to write three or four rules that the opposite sex should follow when dating. Elicit these rules and write them up on the board. Then click on the web site and look at the twenty rules for men and women given on the site. Did your students have any similar ones? Which do your students agree/disagree with?
Describing character
http://www.talkeasy.co.uk/link/materials/esl11.html
Although this web page was designed for teaching children, it is very useful for this unit. Apart from a nice idea about using magazine pictures it also includes a useful presentation of lexical sets. Divide your class into five groups and give each group one set of words. Ask each group to try and write sentences describing the students in their group using the adjectives in the box. Then, read out the sentences and see if the rest of the class can guess who is being described in each sentence.
Geisha
http://www.immortalgeisha.com/
Here is a site devoted to geisha. The site includes information on the history, lifestyle, training, beauty and songs of geisha. Divide your class into groups and get each group to read one section. Ask the groups to write three or four questions about the information they read. For the next lesson make a copy of all the questions and get the students to do a reading race. Finally, find out which pieces of information your students found most interesting.
Unit 11
Unit 11 takes a look at health issues connected to smiling, relaxing and whether you are an optimist or pessimist. Here are a few web sites that can be used to expand on these themes.
Optimist or pessimist?
http://www.queendom.com/tests/personality/optimism_pessimism_r_access.html
Although there is a quiz on page 66 you may find that your students enjoy this topic and would like to do more (or they might disagree with the results of the quiz in the book). Here is an online quiz which adds a new dimension to the topic. The page begins with four very interesting quotes – see if your students agree with these. You will need to register on this site (but this is free) before you can take the quiz. Once you’ve completed the quiz discuss the questions and the results.
Stress
http://www.arc.sbc.edu/stressquiz.html
Here is an interesting quiz . This site has twenty short questions which need to be ranked using adverbs of frequency.
The main thing to remember is that it isn’t so much the taking of the quiz that’s important but the discussions that these quizzes (and the calculations) lead to.
Unit 12
Globalisation
http://www.globalisationguide.org/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/globalisation/0,7368,408592,00.html
On page 70 there is a short text on globalisation, but what is it? Start by brainstorming all that your students know about the issues and write these up on the board. Then click on one of these two sites – the first tries to answer a series of questions about globalisation (can be quite long), while the second links you to a series of articles and stories from Guardian Unlimited. On both sites the language level is quite high so you may want to simplify some of the articles for students.
Protect our planet!
http://archive.greenpeace.org/index.shtml
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/
Unit 12 takes a look at environmental protests. What better place to start than with some of the oldest environmental organisations? Ask your students to choose an environmental issue and then find out as much as they can. You could ask your students to create their own newspaper article on one of the key issues.
‘Che’
http://www.time.com/time/time100/heroes/profile/guevara01.html
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/8702/che.html
http://www.che-lives.com/
There is a short article about Che Guevara on page 74 which may interest your students. The image is well-known but many people seem to know very little about this twentieth century revolutionary. Why not give your students the opportunity to find out more (and possibly create a ‘Che’ corner)? The first of these sites is probably the most useful for your students. Simple, but comprehensive, it gives all the basic information most people want. However, if your students want more then try one of the two other sites – the last one is the ‘official’ site and includes a bank of pictures.
Unit 13
Clubbing
On page 77 there are two web addresses for clubs in Ibiza but unfortunately only one of them works.
http://www.amnesia-ibiza.com/
Lots of information about the club here from location to DJs plus a gallery full of images and a chance to listen to some of the club sounds from the online radio.
Your students could take a look at this site and decide if this is the kind of place they’d like to go when they are on holiday; in their home town; not at all? etc.
Ibiza
http://www.ibiza-spotlight.com/
http://www.ibiza-magazine.com/main.htm
On page 78 there is a listening task called ‘My Ibiza’. Find out what your students know about Ibiza. Have any of your students been there? Ask them what they would do if they were going to Ibiza.
Then put them into small groups and tell them they are going on holiday to Ibiza (you could give them a budget) and they have fifteen minutes to decide what they would do, where they would eat/stay etc. using the information from these two sites.
Billy Elliot
http://www.billyelliot.com/pages/home.html
On page 81 there is a short extract from Billy Elliot, a book by Melvin Burgess which was made into an award-winning film. Here’s a web site dedicated to Billy Elliot. It includes an outline of the story, interviews with the cast (with both audio and text options), pictures and lots more.
