Lesson Plan for Teachers
Review course lesson 1
The aim of this lesson is to get students ready for the course by breaking the ice, introducing some key concepts of reading (and writing) reviews, and presenting an overview of the course and the assignments.
Task 1 Icebreaker
Purpose: This task aims to get students to know one another and encourage interaction.
Background: Much of the course involves students working with one another, so a friendly and cooperative classroom atmosphere should be developed.
Procedure:
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Draw 4 shapes on the board (square, triangle, circle rectangle). In each, write a number relating to your life (e.g. 35 = age, 3 = number of dogs). Students guess what each number represents by asking questions.
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Working students create their own shapes and information. In groups (or mill-drill) students guess the meaning of one another’s facts.
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If the task goes quickly, switch partners.
Feedback: To close the task, ask students how many interesting facts they found out about their classmates.
Timing: 15+ minutes
Task 2: Review of hobby course
Purpose: This task aims to review the previous course and contextualize the reviews.
Background: The review course builds on the skills developed in the hobby course. Before introducing on reviews, this task focuses on students’ free time activities which might be related to the kinds of reviews they read (and will write later in the course).
Procedure:
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In pairs, students discuss questions on the ‘Hobbies’ questionnaire.
Feedback: Focus attention on the final question with a view to seeing whether reviews are a part of how they network with others.
Material: Hobbies questionnaire (Handout 1)
Timing: 30 minutes
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Course preview:
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Explain to students the course focuses on reviews, and students will be expected to produce reviews.
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Use your own hobby as the basis for the survey (My hobby is reading, and I get reviews of books from Goodreads.)
Task 3: Class survey
Purpose: This task aims to get students conduct a class survey on usage of reviews.
Background: The course introduces a range of reviews. This task aims to get students to think about the different kinds of reviews available, and where they may find reviews.
Procedure:
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Give students two prompts relating to reviews: What reviews…, Where… and allow students to formulate 2 questions of their own.
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Students mill and collect data for their questions from all members of the class. If the class is online, put students into large groups (6 people) to survey.
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Students make a summary of their findings (e.g. ‘Almost all of us read game reviews’)
Feedback: Get students to share their findings with the class.
Timing: 20 minutes.
Alternative option: The survey is conducted as a google form and students discuss the results.
Task 4: Analyzing reviews
Purpose: This task introduces students to examples of reviews, and orients them to looking at the language in them.
Background information: Reviews can be classified and organized in a variety of ways. In this task students analyze 3 reviews – one for a place, one for a product, and one for a movie, and decide if there are differences in the language used in each.
Activity stages:
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Groups of 2 or 3
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Give students three reviews (see handout) and answer the questions.
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As an extension, students can guess what is being reviewed and finding another similar review.
Resources: Reviews (Handout 2)
Timing: 20 minutes
Introduce course outline in detail, and the evaluation criteria.
Homework: Personal introduction
Purpose: The video is a useful way to get feedback on the language level and confidence of the students. It also introduces students to the Flipgrid app, which will be used later in the course with the review videos. Flipgrid is a video sharing app for a closed community (like a classroom) which allows students to share videos for feedback from peers.
Activity:
Students deliver a 45 second introduction of themselves on Flipgrid. In addition to their names, they can talk about their hobbies and what they hope to get from the class.
(optional) Encourage students to watch and comment on one another’s videos.
Resource: https://flipgrid.com (with appropriate classroom link)
Timing: Set the Flipgrid timer to 45 seconds per video.