Bizarre stories from Ananova
In our session June 11, I mentioned an article I'd spotted out of the corner of my eye on one of my default start pages, Ananova.com, or more specifically Ananova's "Quirkies" bizarre news stories section.
The headline read:
With a story like the first you could obviously ask students to predict what they thought the explanation might be. They could then read the text to find out if they were right. I remember playing a game called Balderdash, in which you got a word, a correct definition of the word, and had to invent three more, with your opponents then having to guess which was the correct one; you could do something similar with stories like this one.
With the second, and others like it, there's always the question of whether or not such stories are true, or merely urban legends -- a discussion topic I've always found works well.
And the third might make an interesting piece of writing: how many song titles can your learners cram in, but still make a coherent story. They could obviously use someone other than the Beatles.
Not searching, having things come to you
In our session, I mentioned Ananova.com being one of my start pages as an example of how you can have things come to you, and not have to go searching the Internet for them.
An alternative to Ananova would be Yahoo's Oddly Enough news section, with similar stories.
Changing your default start page
Check this previous post if you aren't sure how to change the default start page of your browser.
The headline read:
Green blood shockerOther recent stories have included:
Surgeons operating on a man were shocked to find he had green blood
Robber caught - by mumWhat could you do with them?
A Czech armed robber who targeted McDonald's restaurants was grabbed by the ear and marched to the police station by his mum
Beatles blast for beer burglar
A judge sentenced a Beatles-loving thief by quoting 42 of the band's song titles in his verdict
With a story like the first you could obviously ask students to predict what they thought the explanation might be. They could then read the text to find out if they were right. I remember playing a game called Balderdash, in which you got a word, a correct definition of the word, and had to invent three more, with your opponents then having to guess which was the correct one; you could do something similar with stories like this one.
With the second, and others like it, there's always the question of whether or not such stories are true, or merely urban legends -- a discussion topic I've always found works well.
And the third might make an interesting piece of writing: how many song titles can your learners cram in, but still make a coherent story. They could obviously use someone other than the Beatles.
Not searching, having things come to you
In our session, I mentioned Ananova.com being one of my start pages as an example of how you can have things come to you, and not have to go searching the Internet for them.
An alternative to Ananova would be Yahoo's Oddly Enough news section, with similar stories.
Changing your default start page
Check this previous post if you aren't sure how to change the default start page of your browser.
Labels: Ideas for lessons, Reading activities, Speaking activities
posted by Tom at 8:25 AM
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