Listening activity

6 minute English


Reading the classics

In this programme, Alice and Yvonne discuss why people today don't seem to read the classics as much as they did in the past, and we hear how the Royal Spanish Academy is using modern technology to get more of us excited about reading the classic Don Quixote.

This week's question:
In 2005, the BBC announced the UK's best loved - or favourite book. What was it?
a) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by JK Rowling
b) The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
c) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Listen out for the answer in the programme. At the bottom of the page you 'll find a Vocabulary section.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/sixminute/2010/10/101014_6min_classics_page.shtml



The London Tube

Yvonne and Alice discuss the experiences different people have when using The Tube, the London Underground train system, and hear about what some people thought after using it for the first time.
This week's question:

During the last financial year, how many kilometres did Tube trains travel? Was it about equal to:
a) 72 trips to the moon and back
b) 85 trips to the moon and back or
c) 90 trips to the moon and back

Listen out for the answer in the programme. At the bottom of the page you 'll find a Vocabulary section.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/sixminute/2010/11/101125_6min_tube_page.shtml


Tea drinking in the UK

Yvonne and Alice talk about how tea became a very popular drink in the UK and and we hear how many cups of tea British people drink every day.
This week's question:

Some people say Britain is a nation of tea drinkers. According to the UK Tea Council, how many cups of tea are drunk by the British everyday? Is it:
a) 12,000
b) 120,000
c) 120,000,000
Listen out for the answer in the programme. At the bottom of the page you 'll find a Vocabulary section.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/sixminute/2010/12/101209_6min_tea_page.shtml


Population explosion

Alice and Finn talk about a population explosion in the world - and how engineers suggest it can be dealt with.
This week's question:
How many zeros are there after the 1 in a billion?
a) 12
b) 9
c) 6
Listen out for the answer at the end of the programme!
At the bottom of the page you 'll find a Vocabulary section.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/sixminute/2011/01/110119_6min_populations_page.shtml

Credits Gabi T.

Before the Law by Kafka

Time to read!

As well as "A Drink in the Passage," we will deal with "Before the Law" by Kafka. Gabi has kindly scanned the short short story for you (mind you, it´s not the same as the translation you´ll find in internet).

Time to listen!

A 3 minute video with an adaptation of Before The Law (as featured in Orson Wellses' movie "The Trial"):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqPeI7-eVgc&feature=related  (There are also other videos to watch)

Time to think!

What's/'re the meaning/s of the story?

There're plenty of analyses and discussion forums about this story on the Net.  Look for summaries or essays and take one to class. Highlight the most important ideas to read aloud or retell (2 minutes), and then say if you agree or disagree (+ invite others to express their point of view).


Credits Gabi T!!

Tuesday 8th's micro stories

Please tell us which story you chose for today and, if you can, include the link to it.
Thanks
F

FLASH FICTION MAGAZINES

http://www.flashfictiononline.com/
http://www.vestalreview.net/index.html
Choose a story you like and get ready to tell it to the class.

Listen to flash fiction! http://www.flashfictiononline.com/podcasts.html

LET X

Let x

by Chad Simpson

Let x equal the moment just after he tells her he’s starting a club for people who know something about computers.

It is summer, 1984, and this is their grade school playground. She is idling on a swing over a patch of scuffed earth. He stands just off to the side, one hand on the chain of the swing next to hers.

Let y equal her laughter. Her laughter sounds like a prank phone call at three a.m. It sounds a little evil.

She throws her head back, and even though he is hearing the y of her laughter in the wake of that moment x, he can’t stop staring at her hair. He can’t believe how black, how shiny, how perfect it is.

She stands up out of the swing and asks, “What do you know about computers?”

It is 1984. Nobody at this elementary school—or in Monmouth, Illinois, in general—knows all that much about computers.

Let z equal the face he makes. The face is not a reaction to her question but to her laughter.

He was trying to impress her with this computer club. He knows she is smarter than he is. He knows that she was, in fact, smarter than everyone in the entire fifth grade, and that next year, when they start pre-algebra, she will be the smartest person in the sixth grade, too.

He can’t help the z of his face. He feels humiliated. His ears are tiny fires, and her hair and face, both of which he finds beautiful, has always found beautiful, are beginning to blur together. She has stopped laughing, but he can still hear the ghost of it as he searches for a variable that might make it as if none of this ever happened.

In a moment she will step closer to him, recognizing in some way his humiliation, and wanting to make him feel better, but he will think she is about to say or do something even worse than she has already done, and he will misinterpret her gesture. When she gets close to him, he will kick her in the stomach—harder than he has ever kicked anyone.

He will regret this before she even begins to cry. She will double over, gasping for breath, and look up at him with dry eyes, and he will know that the hurt he has just inflicted upon her is at least equal to but probably greater than the hurt caused to him by the y of her laughter.

He will feel terrible, and he will immediately think back to x, the variable that started this whole rotten equation.

Let x equal not the moment just after he tells her about the computer club, but the moment just before it.

Let x be his saying nothing about this club and instead telling her something he’s always wanted to say.

Let x be a different gesture altogether. Something honest. Tender.

Let x.

http://asitoughttobe.com/2010/05/09/let-x-by-chad-simpson/

THE CHILDREN´S FACTORY

The Children’s Factory

Michael Stewart

For little girls with dirty hems and boys who scratch their knees, there is the ever-small door of the children’s factory. Little red bricks stacked forty feet high and windows by the hundred covered in dirt and ivy. And what light comes through comes green and dirty and too thick to make it all the way to the floor. The machines run by tiny hands. In the bowels, in the guts. In the very intestinal tract of it there is a machine run by tiny hands. This is the proper way to speak to children. The Devil only knows what their great machine does – other than wheeze and breathe. Perhaps they are digging – why not? And scraping and pulling. There is after all not a man among them over four feet tall. For breakfast they mix their milk with sugar, except when they are ill. Then they stir into their milk a quick pour of cow’s blood. (It’s good for the constitution. It thickens the skin. It drops the voice.) It’s the old trick, the one with the bottle. Take it in piece by piece. Each small enough to fit through the mouth. It’s the trick with the pear. Slip it in while you can and let it grow until it presses at the sides. Every once in a while they open a window, peek a little head out, and, small like a cat (or some other small, evil thing), ask politely for your child to come and play. The managers once sat in the office that overlooks the machine. A platform of windows. The newcomers. The youngest ones have a natural authority. An inclination. A sudden mastery of the machine and an idea of how it fits together. Maybe even an understanding. But these things dim with height. The older ones are sent to posts still deeper in the machine, where wonder is a thing of pistons and gears. And over time they come up less and less, no longer fitting through the door.

http://www.birkensnake.com/childrensfactory.php