Lesson plan

----For Book 1 Unit 5 Parents and Children Text A “A Time for Memories”

Textbook: Zooming In: An Integrated English Course (Book 1), by Qin Xiubai, published by Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press

Teacher:

Text: Unit 5 Text A “A Time for Memories”

Students: freshmen, non-English majors

Time: 3 periods (120mins)

Teaching aid: computer and blackboard

I. Students’ autonomous learning before class:

1. Think about the questions in the section of Get Started. Students are at the beginning of their college study and their English proficiency is not very good. If they think about these questions before class, they will have something to say easily when they are asked about relevant topics during the class.

2. Learn the new words in advance.

II. Analysis of the textbook:

Zooming In: An Integrated English Course (Book 1), published by Shanghai Foreign

Language Education Press, is a new college English textbook targeting at non-English majors. It aims to train freshmen’s integrated skills and autonomous learning ability. The book consists of 8 theme-based units. Classroom teaching focuses on Text A and students are expected to read Text B and finish all the tasks on their own with the help of the learner’s CD. It is strongly suggested that students’ autonomous learning ability should be developed by classroom activities, such as pair work and group work, and online supervision, conferencing as well as face-to-face tutorials.

III. Analysis of the Text A:

Text A is a narrative piece of writing about the unforgettable time between mother and children. The article firstly presents the past fond memories between the author and her mother under a pine tree in a park nearby. And then it moves to the stories between the author and her sons. By stories between two generations, the author tells us that love and memory will never “die”. Mother’s love is common and great. Therefore, students will have a new and deep understanding about mother’s love by understanding the whole text.

IV. Teaching approach:

The integration of communicative and task-based teaching approach.

V. Teaching objectives for Text A:

By the end of the classes about this unit, students will be able to:

(Knowledge objective)

1. grasp and know some useful words and expressions.

2. make clear the writer’s purpose to write the text and the ideas about the relationship

between mother and children.

(Affective objective)

3. feel and understand the special love between mother and children.

4. know that love and memory will never “die” even people die.

(Competence objective)

5. talk about and write their relationship with their parents with useful expressions.

6. acquire the reading skill.

7. retell the story.

V. Key and difficult points:

1. Grasp the information of the text and understand it.

2. Be able to apply the useful expressions to talk about or write parents and their love.

VI. Teaching procedures:

1. Reading (40mins)

1) Pre-reading activities (6mins)

Task1: Appreciation of two family photos

Task2: Discussion: Please talk about your parents and their love?

2) While-reading activities (28mins)

Task 1: The first reading (skimming, 8mins)

Read the text quickly and finish the table on Page 155. While reading, please underline the

unknown words or expressions.

Task 2: The second reading (scanning, 20 mins)

Step 1: Questions and answers (17 mins)

Questions in Part I for detailed understanding:

1. Where was the writer at the beginning of the story?

2. What did the writer and her mother usually talk about under the pine tree in recent years?

3. What was the mother’s response when the writer told her she was getting married?

4. What did the writer compare the growth of the pine tree to?

5. What did the writer get to know about her mother that afternoon? What did the writer and

her mother do that day?

Answers:

1. She was in a park, sitting on an old blanket under a pine tree.

2. They usually talked about life. However, sometimes they also recalled events that

happened when the writer was a child, such as her first time dating and her senior prom.

3. Her mother cried on hearing the news, but with tears of joy.

4. The growth of the pine trees was compared to the growing closeness between the writer

and her mother and their deepening love for each other.

5. She knew that her mother was dying of heart disease and there was not any solution to this

problem. The writer and her mother cried, held each other and wished for more time together.

Questions in Part II for detailed understanding:

1. What happened to the mother after that day?

2. Who did the writer bring to the same spot in the park? What did they talk about there?

3. What did the writer’s oldest son do one day?

4. What was the writer’s response at the news?

Answers:

1. She died soon after that day.

2. The writer brought her sons there and they talked about family picnics, gatherings and her

mother, who died before the boys were born. She also told them the funny things when they

were small and praised them for what they had done well.

3. He wanted to meet his mother in the park and told her the news that he was getting

married soon.

4. She cried tears of joy, hugged him and told him that she was proud he had grown up.

Step 2: Finish the exercise Task Two on page 155. (3mins)

1. Recently, the family had picnics and gatherings quite often under the pine tree in the park.

2. When the writer told her mother that she was going to get married, her mother felt very sad.

3. The deepening love and close relationship between the writer and the mother grew with the

pine tree.

4. The daughter guessed that her mother was dying before her mother told her the truth

5. The writer’s sons came to the pine tree often after their grandmother died because their

grandmother used to take them there.

6. The writer occasionally visited the pine tree after her mother’s death because she missed

her mother.

Answers: FFTTFF

3) Post-reading (6mins)

Task 1: Story retelling

Task 2: Discussion: How do you feel about the love in the text?

2. Grammar points (65mins) (略)

Task 1: Useful words and phrases

Task 2: Sentences paraphrase

Task3: Checking some exercises on page 167-173 in the textbook

3: Discussion (13m) (略)

Did you find some similarities and differences between your parents’ love and that between the writer and her mother?

4. Homework: (2m) (略)

In about 100-120 words, write about an incident of misunderstanding between you and your father/mother. Tell us about how it all started and what happened in the end. VII. Reflection:

1. Some details of the teaching plan can be flexibly changed according to different situations.

2. Since students’ autonomous learning ability is emphasized, some teaching materials will be offered to them before class for their better preparation.

3. In real teaching, some regular classroom activities, such as news report or role play, will be organized for students.