This exercise is linked to the topic The limits of the tabloid media.
Opener: Ask students to answer the following questions on a piece of paper to turn in: Would you ever consider being on a reality TV show-why or why not? Do you think reality TV influences how society behaves-if so, how? Should reality TV be regulated or only on at certain times of the day-why or why not? (10-15 min)
1)Speaking: Call on some of the students and ask for their answers (choose one student for each question), and facilitate discussion. (5-10 min)
2)Reading: Put the students into small groups, and have them read through the Spectator article together (making sure each person in the group reads at least once). Instruct them to underline words they don’t know as they read. Then, after passing out English dictionaries to each group, have them look up the meanings of each word and write them on a piece of paper. Instruct each group to send one person to the board and write the words with their definitions on the board. The other students should write down the other definitions and discuss. (20-30 min)
3)Writing: If there’s time, divide the words written on the board among the groups, and instruct each group to come up with sentences using their words. Call on each group to read their sentences out loud and correcting them when necessary. (10 min)
This exercise is published as part of Spectator College, a programme created by The Slovak Spectator with the support of Sugarbooks, a distributor of foreign language books. The author works at the Evanjelické lýceum in Bratislava as an English-language instructor.
