There are four units in this curriculum, each built around a different country.
Each unit is structured as follows:
An introductory video
Four activities
A mini research project
A song
Students are encouraged to use the website themselves and engage directly with the online content. You can read more about to how monitor and guide this style of learning in our Supporting Students section of the Teachers Guide. Whenever they finish a task, let them cut out and stick the matching postage stamp into their Learning Passports (which can be found and downloaded from the Printables section of the Teachers Guide)
A brief overview of each activity is provided below including suggestions on how to guide your students through each task.
The sections that follow thereafter provide additional detail and elaborate on how best to support your students throughout this unit, including how to utilize videos in the classroom; guiding students to use the website; where and how to emphasise peer learning; how to support your students when they are navigating the website themselves.
Unit Introduction
Begin the unit by watching the video for the associated country with your students. Lead a brief class discussion about what the students saw or heard, what they found interesting and if they had any questions about the content of the video. If necessary, go back and watch the video, or specific parts, again. (More can be read about this on the Approaches to Videos section of the Teachers Guide)
Activity 1
The first activity is a short set of questions and answers that relate to the comprehension of the video content. The activity builds understanding and encourages the use of new vocabulary. Decide which method of delivery of this activity best suits your class. There are several options:
Teacher-led as a class using one device
Students working collaboratively in small groups or pair on shared devices
Print out the quiz and ask students to work individually or in pairs
Extension: Can the students generate any further questions about the video?
Activity 2
The second activity includes games such as; a word search, hangman, quiz or a spelling game. Each uses vocabulary associated with the country being explored. Again, students can do this individually or in groups depending on the technological resources available.
Activity 3
The third activity is a gap fill exercise. Display the provided PowerPoint presentation file and then allow your students to interact with it; discussing, presenting or writing out the English answers to the questions. Link this information through a class discussion in which students can revise and reflect on their responses and correct their language where needed. Students are encouraged to re-watch the video in sections and complete the sentences with the necessary vocabulary.
Activity 4
The fourth activity focuses on grammar. The emphasis for each unit is as follows:
Unit 1: Canada - Simple Present
Unit 2: United Kingdom - Simple Past
Unit 3: South Africa - Simple Future
Unit 4: Taiwan - Present Progressive
A PowerPoint presentation file is provided. Additionally, this could be a good opportunity to delve deeper into grammatical competencies that you are currently working on as a class. Students may revise completed sentences and then post to the embedded Padlet application. For example; students may pose a question in the Padlet that classmates could read and post responses.
Activity 5
The fifth activity has two parts: a research and self-teaching section and then a project and knowledge output platform. Firstly, allow the students to do some research on the country. This research can be achieved on platforms such as Google, YouTube, or Wikipedia, depending on your preference and the desires of your class. Then, allow your students to find a point of interest concerning the country and put together a project. This project may be as simple as a drawing, a poster or an oral presentation, but we would also invite your students to attempt a media-style project.
A media-style project could include; putting together a powerpoint presentation, building a simple website or blog, filming a video or coding a game. Options will depend on the technological resources in your school and the level and ability of your students. The chief purpose of this activity is to allow your students to creatively show what they have learned, through use of the English language, and a project that they have designed and made themselves.
We have put together a description of how to assist your students when allowing them to do their own online research and possible ideas for the final project structure in our Supporting Students section of the Teachers Guide.
Activity 6
Finally, a song from each country has been provided which can be used as a fun, closing activity in the classroom. Either listening to the music or trying to learn the song and sing it together as a class. Possible strategies to teaching the songs include; adding actions and dance to convey meaning, singing only refrains initially before adding verses, singing only key words, exploring the structure of rhymes within the texts, researching games associated with songs such as London Bridge, locating other children's songs and music games in English. We hope this will lead to further inquiry, discussion and creativity!
