Page 244 - Beyond Methods

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Integrating language skills
when I usually purchase store brands) that I would never have pur- chased. She is not poor and neither are we, but my husband and I are at a loss as to why she would take advantage of us in this way. She didn’t even leave the used magazines for us to see!
Should I confront her or just let sleeping dogs eat their $10 bones? (Source: San Jose Mercury News, 3/18/2001)
10.1.2 Make photocopies of the selected text, or copy it onto an OHP transparency. In class, before you distribute it to your learners, read the text aloud in normal speed, pausing at crucial places. For instance, read aloud the first two sentences. Pause. Ask the learners to guess what they would expect the writer to say about her mother. Read the next three sentences. Pause. Ask. Then, read the first sentence of the second paragraph, and so on. At an appropriate point in the reading (e.g., at the end of the first paragraph), ask them what the writer is seeking advice about.
10.1.3 Distribute copies of the text, or project it on the OHP. Ask your learners to read it carefully. Encourage them to seek clarification to help them understand the text.
10.1.4 Form small groups and have them discuss the immediate is- sues raised in the text, zeroing in on the mother’s action and the daugh- ter’s reaction.
10.1.5 Ask each group to prepare a consensus report of what they would have done if they were in the position of the daughter.
10.1.6 Depending on the proficiency level, encourage them to dis- cuss larger issues of cultural and social beliefs involving the concept of family, which individuals are considered to constitute a family, and a mother’s relationship with her daughter’s family and vice versa.
10.1.7 Have a representative from each group present the group’s consensus report to the class, and lead a discussion on what emerges.
10.1.8 After giving adequate time for preparation, ask a couple of active, enterprising students to role-play a possible mother-daughter encounter assuming that the daughter has been advised, and has de- cided, to confront her mother.
10.1.9 Ask them to pretend that they are the experts the writer is turn- ing to for advice. Have them write in class, individually, an appropriate response to the writer, specifically addressing the last question raised by her. If there are learners from different cultural or subcultural back- grounds, encourage them to write about how members of their cultural community would have reacted to the daughter’s complaint about her mother.