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ESL Lesson - Reported Speech - Celebrity Gossip - Intermediate and Up




   Here's a reported speech lesson that you can do with Intermediates and up that deals with celebrity gossip. At the end of the lesson, students will use reported speech by taking the roles of journalists to describe the events of a crazy hollywood party.

Introduction: (just a few minutes)

Here are some possibilities and any of them will work.
1. Come in whispering various things in students' ears
2. Come in roleplaying being a reporter
3. Show different tabloids of celebrities
4. Show a clip of a TMZ-like show

With all of these you want to try and elicit the concept of gossip (especially celebrity gossip)

Lead in: (around 7 minutes)
Demo these questions out and then have students answer them in groups or pairs.
1. What is gossip?
2. Where can you hear about celebrity gossip? 4 different ways/sources.
3. Any interesting celebrity gossip currently happening now? Name 3.

 Target Language: (under 10 minutes)
 Tip: In general with reported speech it's good to use verb shift. You can tell them though that if they are reporting something that is still relevant now or just happened, you don't have to use verb shift.

 Announce to the class that you're tired. Then on the board have ' chris .... ... . ... ... .  ' Elicit the correct sentence in reported speech. Keep eliciting and go over all of the rules this way. Depending on the level you can go over things like 'today -> that day' 'tomorrow -> the following day' 'here -> there' and so on.

Tip: Watch your TTT. Whenever I teach grammar there's no explaining involved. I go right into eliciting it out. Keep your pace fast  Also watch for verb shift. Make sure that they are using the correct forms and everything. Move with them at their level. When they get one form, then go to the next. Make sure that there's not just one student saying all of the right answers.

Study 1: ( 7 min)

Tip: Since this activation deals with celebrity gossip, make all of your studies related to that topic. This will help them use any auxiliary lexis that might come up in your activation

Students go around the class with each one saying a statement and the other student putting it into reported speech. Then this student will say a new statement and the next student will put it into reported speech and so on

Tip: If you want to make this more random and avoid students going 'round the class' use a ball. Students say a statement and then throw the ball to another student and so on. Also work on things like speed. You want this to move fast. Practice and push the pace.


Study 2: ( 7 min)
Hand out pictures of different celebrities with speech bubbles. Each celebrity will have a few statements pre written on them. Students will work in groups. Students will go back and forth asking and telling each other what each celebrity said.


Activation: (around 15 minutes total)
Set up:
Give half of the class a celebrity and the other half are reporters. Tell the class that they are at a hollywood party and all of the celebrities are a little bit drunk and saying some ridiculous things. Students get up and mingle and the reporters record the gossip. Play music, make it fun, encourage celebrities to say outlandish things and revelations about their careers and personal lives.

Activation: Gossip Show
Demo out or show a clip of a reporter reporting on gossip. Have the reporters work together and present what they heard to the class. Make it sound and feel like a celebrity show. Have the reporters ask each other questions like 'what else did he say?' ' That's incredible, was anything else revealed?' and so forth. The trick is to make it sound natural and real. Once they have done this, switch roles, have another party with new celebrities and repeat the process

Tip: You can't have reported speech without direct speech. So try and make sure that the celebrities are saying a lot of things.

Feedback: (just a few minutes)
Get basic feedback, board and correct mistakes, end the lesson with a joke.

*Want your own lesson? Just leave a comment and I'll make one for you.


Cheers,
Chris
TEFL Prague courses - The Language House TEFL

Comments

  1. These are all good ideas but they rely on a certain approach from students ... that they can identify with celebrity gossip and are sympathetic to it and they have the imagination and energy to contribute effectively. Many students don't have such resources to call upon and need much more structured exercises in order to produce on their own and still do something original without relying on drier grammar exercises. I think the first idea - going into the class and whispering things to each student - has greater potential but could be developed more. How about thinking of some items of gossip about each student (if you know your students well, you'll know what their boundaries are) and they can then share the gossip. To help students remember, give the direct speech version of each item of 'gossip' on a piece of paper.

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