I teach current Affairs on the ELAS course at IFCELS/SOAS.
School of Oriental and African Studies
INTERNATIONAL FOUNDATION COURSES AND ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES
English Language ands Academic Studies
CURRENT AFFAIRS Summer 2006
Part 1
In this option you will be practising all language skills except for formal writing. It is about getting you to research, think critically, analyse and talk confidently about current issues in the media.
Each week about three students will tell the rest about their topic. At the beginning of term this will simply take the form of informal discussions as we get to know each other. By the end of the term you will be making presentations.
The process works like this:
• You choose an area of interest in the news.
• You read it (preferably from more than one source) and get a good understanding of what it is about.
• You identify 5 – 10 items of vocabulary that are of interest or new to you. Some of them will be phrasal verbs, phrases, idioms and metaphors that comprise several words, as these are very common in native English and advanced learners need to develop awareness of them.
• You consider the topic and form some level of opinion in reaction to it.
• You introduce and preview the topic for us: at first, simply explain the main points (or sides, if the topic is controversial or involves conflict of ideas).
• You teach the group the vocabulary and phrases of interest.
• You then provide your opinion or interpretation of the events or issues.
• You finally invite other students to agree or disagree, or to respond with an opinion of their own, analysis of their own and any known implications of the events and issues, etc.
In the first few weeks, the process will be very interactive, involving all students in discussion. Later in the course, after looking at presentation skills, you will structure your delivery in a more formal manner, as in a seminar.
After you’ve finished, the class will talk about your session:
Did the teacher take note of any pronunciation problems you have?
Were there any repeated grammatical errors?
Was there any particularly impressive language?
Did you give everyone a fair chance to speak?
Were you able to interrupt politely, or to change topic politely when you need to? You may need to when someone talks too much, to maintain control.
Were you able to encourage quiet students to speak up? Can you deal with any disagreement? These may be necessary when leading a discussion.
Did you listen carefully to the class comments and respond to what they said?
Were you polite and friendly while still remaining authoritative?
If you haven’t found an article you’ll still need to lead a discussion to find out what everyone else knows about a given topic! If you did this, your teacher would supply you with the topic on the day.
Part 2
Setting up a current affairs news Blog
Task 1 Discuss with a partner:
What is a blog? Have you ever had one? Do you ever read blogs? What different types of blog are there?
Task 2
You are going to set up a personal blog for the duration of this ELAS Current Affairs course. This will be a way for you to keep a diary of the course and include text and photos so that everyone on the world wide web can see and read about your thoughts and experiences.
This will also provide good practice for you in writing English and linking text and image. The primary aim is to keep a current affairs news blog- you will add your personal opinions to news stories you have found and used for presentation material during these classes. You will probably also wish to write your comments on news stories selected by other students in the class
Homework week 1
Have a look at the following blogs and consider what features make a good blog.
What can we learn about the people who wrote them?
http://leninology.blogspot.com/
http://junkozaru.blogspot.com/
http://kotaji.blogsome.com/
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/
http://so-soas.blogspot.com/
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/
http://blog.zmag.org/blog/13
http://london.photobloggers.org/blog
Task 3
Choose a blogging host- sign up and start blogging.
http://www.blogger.com/start
http://www.blogeasy.com/
http://spaces.msn.com/
http://www.blog.co.uk/
http://www.theblog.net/
http://www.blogthing.com/
http://www.newblog.com/
Any others??
Task 4
After you have set up your blog let the other students and English teachers know the URL.
Try to post at least two/three paragraphs per day.
Discuss with your partner what type of topics you can write about. The blog should be a multimedia diary detailing your course here at IFCELS and your time in London.
What type of media can you add to the blog? How can you divide your blog into different sections?
Task 5
Over the next ten weeks give each other feedback on your blogs. We will spend some time in class analysing the content of the bogs you set up.
At the end of term a special IFCELS/SOAS current affairs best blog prize is awarded to the most fantastic blog on display!
