2. EXERCISES FOR DISCUSSION:
2.1 HOAXES: What hoaxes could these people play? And how far would people believe them?
- Your English teacher
- Your nation´s leader
- Your best friend
- A family member
2.2 NO JOKE: Which of these are most believable and which are a total joke? Rate them from 1 to 7:
- Scientists have found aliens
- Chinese will be the world language
- We can live to be 150
- Jobs will become unnecessary
- A young adult will be US President
- All music will be free
- The world will end
2.3 PUBLICITY: Write down all the words you associate with the word 'publicity' and 'stunt' you may want to use in our discussion.
2.4 PUBLICITY STUNT DISCUSSION: Here are some questions you can try asking yourself before you come to our discussion on Wednesday:
1. What did you think when you read the headline?
2. Have you heard this news on TV? What did you think at the time?
3. What do you think of this story? What do you know about this story?
4. What do you think of amateur scientists?
5. What springs to mind when you hear the word 'stunt'?
6. What publicity stunts can you remember?
7. Do you believe Richard Heene?
8. What would you do to become famous for a few minutes?
9. Why do you think Richar Heene might have been seeking publicity?
10. Do you think wanting to become famous changes people?
11. This story is huge on Twitter and on US and UK television. Do you understand why?
12. Have you ever seen a rescue operation?
13. Why did Heene say his son was inside the balloon?
14. What criminal charges should there be?
15. Would you like to or have you ever gone up in a hot-air balloon?
16. How would you feel if you were a passenger on a plane at Denver International Airport and you had to wait several hours?
17. Do you know of any case where people have lied to appear on TV and become famous?
18. What things would people be prepared to do just to appear five or ten minutes on TV?
19. Have you seen any film where becoming popular for a short time was the plot?
PREPARING A DISCUSSION IS FUNDAMENTAL:
THIS MUST BE DONE IN TWO DIRECTIONS:
FIRST, YOU NEED TO LEARN NEW VOCABULARY AND EXPRESSIONS THAT YOU WILL HAVE TO USE FOR THE DISCUSSION.
SECONDLY, YOU HAVE TO PREPARE THE TOPIC BY LOOKING UP INFORMATION IN THE INTERNET, BOOKS, ENCYCLOPAEDIAS.
THIS WAY YOU WILL FEEL MUCH MORE CONFIDENT AND AT THE SAME TIME YOU WILL HAVE MUCH MORE TO TALK ABOUT.
FINAL TASK:
HERE IS ONE FINAL TASK THAT YOU MAY DO IN ORDER TO COVER THE FOUR SKILLS YOU SHOULD FOCUS ON WHEN LEARNING A LANGUAGE: LISTENING, READING, SPEAKING AND WRITING.Write a composition and leave it in the blog as a comment to Session 5, I will edit it in the blog so that everybody can learn from other people´s opinions.
Choose one of the following topics:
2. Write a letter to Mr. Heene supporting him and saying you believe him or critizising and saying you believe he is a liar. Ask him about the balloon incident, give him suggestions about what he should do at the moment and about what he should have done when he saw his child was missing.
Dear Mr. Heene,
ReplyDeleteIt is a pleasure for me to write this letter in order to congratulate you for your family’s adventure, meanly because of these two matters that I have called ‘The Butterfly Effect’ and ‘The Tale of the Wolf’.
As you surely know all our actions have a consequence, not just on surrounding people but all over the world. So your heroic adventure has had consequences: some people had to risk their life trying to save your poor boy in danger, other had to wait some hours in the airport, not to mention money and resources authorities generously wasted by fighting against clock to rescue your son.
On the other hand, I imagine you are interested in being a good model for your child, and that is because you are my idol, instead of telling him The Tale of the Wolf, as we do in Spain, you are a genius, your performed the tale acting as shepherd and you did it perfect, everybody believed you and from now on when someone has an emergency situation, authorities will think that it ill be only another joke and then they will act more patiently.
Sincerely yours,