Unit 1

Ⅰ. Objectives

After studying this unit, the students are expected to

1. Master the basic language and skills necessary to ask for and give clarification;

2. Understand the main ideas of Text A, Text B, and master the useful sentence structures and words and expressions found in the exercises relevant to the first two texts;

3. Know how to write a letter of invitation; 4. Know how to use V+V-ing;

5. Guess the meaning of unknown words in context (1). Part I Listening & Speaking

Listening & Speaking teaching plan (4 periods)

The teacher begins with the Preview to make sure that the students have some idea of what this unit is all about. After that, the teacher activates the Listening and Speaking exercises as follows

1) The Language for Asking For and Giving Clarification

Have a warm-up activity by asking students what they would say when they can’t hear others’ words; Possible answers:

Sorry, I can’t hear clearly…

Exercise me, but what did you say?

I didn’t understand what do you mean by…? …

How to answer?

What do I want to say is that… I’m saying… …

Have the students listen to Exercise 1 (1-3 times) and fill in the blanks with the missing words;

Ask one student to read aloud the talk so students can check their completed answers;

2) Asking For and Giving Clarification

Go through the new words in the first dialogue in Exercise 3; Available 有空的 unavailable 没空的，不可能的

lie 撒谎 fib 小谎

Have the students listen to the dialogue twice and fill in the blanks with the missing words;

Ask students to answer the questions about the dialogue;

Now have them look for the language used to asking for and giving clarification;

Next, students can role play the dialogue;

Then have them either do the same with the second dialogue or be creative with it;

3) Listening Practice

Before ending, the teacher tells the students how to do Exercises 5-10 as their assignment.

Some skills: get the main idea of the short dialogue; Give emphasis to the key words; etc.

Part II

Text A & text-related exercises teaching plan (4 periods) 1) Starter

After a brief explanation of the instructions, the teacher

A. gives the students a few minutes to think about the questions in the starter; B. asks some students to respond to the questions (10 minutes). 2) Text A A.

lets the students answer the text related questions, helps them identify the main idea of each paragraph and analyzes some difficult sentences and some language points while discussing the whole text with the students (one and a half periods); B.

Guides the students through the exercises, focusing on certain items or leaving some exercises as the students’ homework according to the students different levels of English (one period). Practical Writing

The teacher tells as well as shows the students how to reply to an invitation by doing Exercise 11 of Practical Writing, and then requires the students to do Exercise 12 as their homework.

Step 1

1. Background information

Characteristics of English

Vocabulary. English has a larger vocabulary than any other language. There are more than 600,000 words in the largest dictionaries of the English language. Some English words have been passed on from generation to generation as far back as scholars can trace. These words, such as woman, man, sun, hand, love, go, and eat, express basic ideas and feelings. Later, many words were borrowed from other languages, including Arabic, French, German, Greek, Italian, Latin, Russian, and Spanish. For example, algebra is from Arabic, fashion from French, piano from Italian, and canyon from Spanish.

A number of words, such as doghouse and splashdown, were formed by combining other words. New words were also created by blending words. For example, motor and hotel were blended into motel. Words can be shortened to form new words, as was done with history to form story. Words called acronyms are formed by using the first letter or letters of several words. The word radar is an acronym for radio detection and ranging.

Pronunciation and spelling in English sometimes seem illogical or inconsistent. Many words are spelled similarly though pronounced differently. Examples include cough, though, and through. Other words, such as blue, crew, to, too, and shoe, have similar pronunciations but are spelled differently. Many of these variations show changes that occurred during the development of English. The spelling of some words remained the same through the centuries, though their pronunciation changed.

Grammar is the set of principles used to create sentences. These principles define the elements used to assemble sentences and the relationships between the elements. The elements include parts of speech and inflections. Parts of speech are the word categories of the English language. Scholars do not all agree on how to describe the parts of speech. The traditional description lists eight classes: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections. The most important relationships of the parts of speech include subject and verb, verb and predicate, and modifier and the word modified. 2. Starter:

Have you ever had an experience in which you are misunderstood or have failed to understand others? Misunderstandings can result from the spoken form or written form of the language that you use. Perhaps the talk will go like this:

Student A: Misunderstandings are part of life. They are necessary. We learn from our mistakes. It’s sad but true: sometimes pain can help us learn.

Student B: How true! Misunderstandings help us grow. Without falling down, we don’t learn to get up. So a misunderstanding can be good. It means something to us. It tells us something we didn’t know before.

Student C: Now I have a better understanding. I always thought misunderstandings are bad. But now I see they are valuable, maybe even precious. They can make life meaningful.

e.g. 17 and 70 can /can’t right /write red/ read

farther / father / further

affect / effect etc.

Step 2 Reading Analysis

Part I (para.1-3) Misunderstandings may occur among native English speakers. Part II (para.4-5) Non-native English speakers are more often affected Part III (Para. 6) what should people do when misunderstandings occur?

Questions about Para. 1

1) What is the text mainly about?

It is about misunderstandings that similar sounding English words or expressions can cause.

2) Why did the man with uncombed hair and dirty clothes head straight for the restroom when he got on the bus?

He wanted to go to New York without paying for the ticket.

3) What did the passenger at the back of the bus decide to do when she saw the man hiding himself in the restroom?

She decided to tell the bus driver that a bum was hiding in the restroom.

Step 3: Language Points

1. head for: go towards 向?走去；朝?行进 e.g. The ship was heading for Britain.

这艘船正驶向英国。

2. restroom: n. [AmE euphony] public toilet in a hotel, restaurant, etc. ［美］（旅馆、餐馆等公共建筑物内的）公用厕所，洗手间。 请注意，在英国人们通常用toilet一词。

3. … he could ride to New York without paying.