Author Archives: Dariusz Napora vel Dolce Dario

Aside

Consider the consequences

Level: B1 and up Time: 60-75 min

Is your child headed down the wrong road? Hanging out with the wrong crowd? Being disrespectful or doing drugs? If so, the Bibb County Sheriff’s Office may be able to help.

The department’s Consider the Consequences Program helps kids ages 10 to 16-years-old stay in school, graduate and begin a successful career.

This video was inspired by my SS who told me about the true crime genre. I couldn’t believe it, when I first saw it, but as of 2022 the program is still on.

The southern accent, the vocabulary and the topic made it a great material for our class. However…

(Warning!!!) Some of the scenes in the video are very intense. I don’t recommend it for SS younger than 15-16yo.

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October Color Maths

Level: YL Time: 30-45min

mde_vivi

This one really speaks for itself.

Introduce the names of colors. Make sure that kids either are able to read the names of colors or work with a student who does. Distrubute the paints, brushes and worksheets and simply sit back relax (or run around with a cloth wiping the tables clean0. Enjoy!

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Crazy families.

Level: YL Time: 45-60min

This lesson provides an opportunity for YL to practise family vocabulary and have some fun with it.

You can pre-teach the vocabulary or encourage SS to guess the meaning from the context. You can put SS into pairs or groups and hand out the text and image cards for matching. Explain that SS need to read the family descriptions and match each description with its corresponding picture. You can read the cards if your SS can’t do that yet.

After that invite SS to draw a picture of a family. Then they write a short text describing that family. Make an activity similiar to this one with their cards and pictures. My SS loved to see their own work turned into teaching material.

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What’s in it for us?

Level B2/C1 Time: 90min

Putin has declared that referendums in four partially occupied areas of Ukraine have delivered a mandate for assimilation into what Moscow calls Russian territory.

On top of that he has started ‘partial mobilisation’ with plans to recruit 300.000 civilians.

And last week it became clear that Kremlin wants the use of nuclear weapons to be considered a real possibility and, as Putin said, “it’s not a bluff.”

In such circumstances I felt that it’s necessary to introduce the topic of the war in Ukraine in my high school classes.

What started as a search for material on the war, ended up being a very fruitful and enriching experience and discussion on geopolitics, privilege and rhetoric skills.

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Circles and such

Level: YL Time: 60 min

Dzisiaj post po polsku, dla polskich czytelników, bo zajęcia wymagają wyprodukowanej w Polsce gry pt. ‘Kółka i spółka’.

Gra składa się z kart oraz wyciętych z grubej tektury kształtów. Kwadraty, koła, trójkąty i prostokąty w trzech rozmiarach i różnych kolorach.

Moje własne dzieciaki korzystały z gry bardzo chętnie, więc postanowiłem wykorzystać ją do zajęć językowych.

Najbardziej oczywiste jest wykorzystanie gry do wprowadzenia nazw kształtów i rozmiarów. Ja dorzuciłem jeszcze okoliczniki miejsca i inne wyrażenia służące do opisu położenia przedmiotów w przestrzeni.

Zaczynam lekcję od wprowadzenia/powtórzenia nazw kształtów. Potem można zrobić jakieś ćwiczenie TPR w stylu rysowania kształtów na plecach, układanie kształtów z długopisów lub ciał dzieci (jeśli macie na to miejsce 😉).

Potem wchodzi załączony handout. Słownictwo, czytanie, pisanie, słuchanie i mówienie. Wszystko jest.

Zapraszam.

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Huggy Wuggy

Level: B1 Time: 60 min

Plug and play lesson on the controversial topic of Huggy Wuggy the character from a video game called Poppy Platime. The video game is rated for children ages 12 and above. However, law enforcement officials warn that some fan-made videos featuring the character start out with very child-friendly visuals that quickly turn nightmarish so younger children may access them without realizing their true nature.

The police warnings and concerned parents posting appaling comments made Huggy Wuggy a true craze. Which makes it perfect for an up-to-date lesson.

Enjoy.

https://wordwall.net/embed/b6f558bc1b7c478a8b4eaf94555deb50?themeId=41&templateId=76&fontStackId=0
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Stuff That Animals Can & Can’t Do

Time: 45-60 min Level: YL

Lucas the Spider is my all times favorite conversation starter for Young learners. This time he is trying to play hide and seek with a chameleon. He is not doing so great, obviously.

Perfect opportunity to introduce or practice can/can’t strutures and movement/activity vocabulary. I started with a vocabulary presententation in Wordwall and let students play with it for some time.

https://wordwall.net/embed/13a9e5ed10ba47cc8834a48af79dd09f?themeId=41&templateId=76&fontStackId=0

After that we watched the video and talked about the story.

Finally I put two sentnces on the board ‘Lucas can…’ and ‘Lucas can’t… ‘ We brainstormed different ways to finish the sentences. Eventually I distributed the handouts and everybody completed the first two columns.

The last activity was to go outside and find some other animals. Scan them with a GoogleLense, learn about them and complete the table with more information.

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Being an artist

Level: B2 Time: 90min

Some of my students are really artistic. Musicians, painters, video creators etc. this lesson is a tribute to their hobbies and interests.

You can use it with any group that is open to talk about their artistic behaviors. It starts with a discussion on what is art, talent and being creative. After that I recommend a WordWall vocabulary presentation and practice. After that a couple of comprehension questions that can work as a starting point for discussion.

https://wordwall.net/embed/6ebef2d374834782bf416f0a0c2e63f7?themeId=45&templateId=76&fontStackId=0
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Craziest Easter Traditions

Level A2 and up Time: 45-60 min

I fell in love with having my students work with ‘not so perfect’ language. Here is a piece form a Slovakian-Austrian couple Simi and Danny. Their accents are form perfect. They use the wrong words and grammar sometimes. Well… Who cares. The message gets across. I use this kind of content during my classes to invite my students to not be afraid to make mistakes.

The video is also a great starting point for a conversation about gender roles. If your students are interested, you can continue the topic with this lesson: https://englishvee.com/2020/05/05/the-gender-tag/

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