667. Reading the newspaper in the class



One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A, “Using newspapers in the class of English may be very useful, believe me.




This activity is for advanced level students, because they have to face with authentic and genuine language. Realia bring them to real, authentic English. You can tell them to buy a specific paper at a newstand. However, I think this is not realistic in practice: just some of them or most won’t buy them, from my experience. So something you can do is buying a copy, and photocopy a piece of news as many times as students you have. Please show clearly the name of the newspaper you all are going to work on. Another way is to go to the computer room and read the online version, or in their laptops or tablets, etc., if possible...




For me the core point is to actually read the news, its headlines and the body, and understand the contents.




Remember to utilize news that really concerns them or something they know about. Many activities can be implemented: prereading by discussing about the topic and learning or eliciting vocab, reading and rereading while they can ask you any question about vocab or expressions – try explain the meaning in English, with examples, with other words they already know... - , commentaries on the contents, style, also summarizing, relating the picture to the contents, learning idioms.



As well it’s so important, as much as possible, they would somehow enjoy the activity and feel satisfied, for they worked on authentic English. You teacher will also likely learn a lot from your students.” / Photo from: fineartprintsondemand com. Painter Claude Monet reading a newspaper.

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