Let’s go out and grab a bite

Thomas Rau’ s excellent blog (Herr-Rau.de) inspired me to try out a little sequence on restaurants, drinking, road signs. The whole thing can be found here.

Music gonna teach dem a lesson

This is the only project so far that I was able to try out in two completely different school settings so far: Analyzing Protest Songs.

The “Gymnasium” edition is a double-period spent analyzing 4 protest songs with a 12th grade class in a public high school in Aarau. Strange Fruit (Abel Meeropol/Billie Holiday), Testify (Rage Against The Machine), War (Bob Marley) and This Land Is Your Land (Pete Seeger/Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings) were used in this unit. Good class, motivated students and a rather nice atmosphere throughout the two lessons.

The “vocational school” edition was also tested during a double-period with a mixed class of  “Mediamatiker” in Biel, Switzerland. This Land Is Your Land (Pete Seeger/Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings), Bring’ Em Home (Pete Seeger/Bruce Springsteen) and Strange Fruit (Abel Meerepol/Billie Holiday) were used. The songs were somewhat too complicated for my students. Bring’ Em Home worked out fine, though. For the Holiday song, I finally decided to work with the German translation of the text.

If you want to have the songs (as high quality Mp3 files) just tell me via email or drop a line in the comments.

Self checkout

Inspired by a rather old and boring text in the Lifelines Pre-Intermediate English book, I tried to come up with something more relevant for my students: the self checkout system one can find nowadays in grocery stores (just starting in Switzerland).  The entire sequence lasted around 45 minutes, spread out on 2 lessons (around 30 minutes in the first lesson and 15 minutes one week later).  Students were interested by the topic and had a rather positive about the idea of a self checkout. Download the handout (text/questions/homework assignment) here.

Jimi Hendrix – Machine Gun

A small analysis of Jimi Hendrix´s masterpiece Machine Gun (which I have used for a school presentation) can be found here.

Ellis Island

While teaching English in Germany, I tried out a webquest in a 8th grade class about Ellis Island and the Immigration at the very beginning of the 20th century. I did not have a working internet connection, that´s why I had to download everything and print and hand it out to my students. “The long way to America” (a webquest by Andrea Schauff, Franken-Gymnasium, Zülpich) has been used as a basis for my task (which can be downloaded here).  My students had to invent an immigrant and write three diary entries about “their” journey. Tons and tons of work just to correct that stuff but it was well worth it as many students tried to write interesting and mostly realistic stories. The original webquest was created for a 8th grade “Gymnasium” setting, I had to adapt it somewhat for my Realschule setting and I also had to explain quite a bit to my students.

Antisemitismus – an overview

While talking about Switzerland´s role during WWII -  especially the refugees and the closed borders – with a Prima (12th grade), I was asked to provide a basic introduction to the concept of antisemitism. Using a PP-presentation, I tried to explain some of the biggest clichés/prejudices. Here you go (it´s in German).

Eveline – James Joyce

Starting with “Kilkelly, Ireland” as a way to introduce the topic, it´s now time to actually do some reading with the students. Having asked them to read the shortstory “Eveline” by James Joyce (in Dubliners) in advance, I spent a double period discussing central topics (paralysis, symbolism, vision of Ireland, why doesn´t she leave?) of that rather amazingly simply written yet profound work. The homework assignment at the end really worked well. This was done in a Sekunda setting as well. Click here to download the worksheet, the lesson plan and the powerpoint-presentation used to introduce the topic. Once again, email me if you want to get the mp3-file of the song (Solas “When my love and I parted”) as well.

Kilkelly, Ireland

This was used as an introductory lesson in order to read the short story”Eveline” by James Joyce (Dubliners) in a Sekunda. I wanted to emphasise the importance of music when adressing the issued of the Irish emigration in the 19th and early 20th century. The best song I could think of is “Kilkelly, Ireland” by Peter Jones. It´s a really emotional tribute to the hardships of leaving one´s country and how that affects those members of the family remaining in Ireland.

What is the song about?

130 years after his great grandfather John Coyne had left the small village of Kilkelly (in County Mayo) in Ireland, Peter Jones (the song’s author) found a bundle of letters sent to John by his father in Ireland. The letters tell of family news and remind the son that he is loved, missed and remembered by his family at home. The final letters informs him that his father, whom he has not seen for 30 years, has died, the last link with home is broken. A whole history of a family is unfurled before our eyes: “The house is so empty and sad” after the emigration of the sons. The song ends with the touching lines of the brother (Michael) at home finally taking over the father´s duties in writing to the “lad” in America: “And it´s funny the way he kept talking to you, he called for you at the end”. Peter Jones (the author of the song) calls the song “the poignant story of a father who sees his sons emigrate from Mayo to America, never to return. But the words of friendship he son lovingly dispatched, with the help of Pat McNamara his friend, convey so much beauty that they stand out in the classic mould.”.

Thanks to Andreas Kalt at rete-mirabile.net for providing some ideas on how to use that song and how to work on the lyrics. Click here to download the worksheet, the lesson plan and the powerpoint-presentation used to introduce the topic. Email me if you want to get the mp3-file of the song as well.

Berliner Luftbrücke 1948/1949

Einführung/Einstieg/Übersicht (mit. Arbeitsauftrag) zum Thema Berliner Lufbrücke (1948-1949). Es ist wieder einmal eine PP-Sache. Man kann die PP auch sehr gut bei den Themen Deutschland nach dem Krieg, Deutschland 1945-1949, Kalter Krieg (Anfang), Welt nach dem 2. Weltkrieg einsetzen.

South Africa in Swiss classes

A book presentation (powerpoint-based) used for my students to get some knowledge of the book before actually starting reading it. The book could be read in a good tertia or in a sekunda, I guess. Interesting issues (race, guilt, reconciliation, father-son relationships, family, rural world vs. modern big city, adapting to a new context, faith, love) are all dealt with at large in that classic novel (1948, set just before the apartheid).