Contents
=> “The Frog” — poem and Sorting Dictation Activity
=> “Family Limericks” by Zhenya Dudina
=> “Jagr Plays Hockey in Russia” — text and word-pair activity
=> Link: English Language Office, Russian Federation
=> Essay Contest: I Discover America Contest at Hello-online
=> Events: FEELTA Winter Methodology School in Vladivostok
=> In the Next Issue

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“The Frog” — poem and Sorting Dictation Activity
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Here’s a little poem that I remember from my childhood:

The thunder roared
The lightning flashed
A tree fell down
A frog got smashed

Young learners will enjoy writing out the poem and illustrating it with pictures

With more advanced learners, why not try a Sorting Dictation?

Directions:

Tell students to make three columns on a piece of paper: NOUNS, VERBS, ARTICLES.

First you will dictate the NOUNS (in alphabetical order): frog, lightning, thunder, tree. Next dictate the VERBS: got smashed, fell down, flashed, roared. Then dictate the ARTICLES: a, a, the, the

Now ask students to sort the words into 4 sentences, and to arrange the sentences into a poem.

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“Family Limericks” by Zhenya Dudina
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These limericks were written by the very creative Zhenya Dudina, 18, second-year student at Samara State Pedagogical University. Zhenya has been studying English for 12 years, and now she’s learning Hawaiian. She says, it’s hard: “People laugh at me when I try to say something like ‘e kala mai ia u.’”

Family Limericks

My aunt who lived in Madrid
Once climbed up an old pyramid
And said “What a pity!
I can’t see my city
From the top of this old pyramid!”

My sister was looking so pale,
She was paler than the White Whale
When I asked her why,
She gave a deep sigh
And said she had not entered Yale.

I had a middle-aged uncle
Who loved Simon & Garfunkel
He couldn’t do anything
When he heard them both sing,
That strange middle-aged uncle!

My niece is as bright as a button
If you asked her how to cook mutton,
“Slice it and fry” –
Would be the reply
Of this girl as bright as a button.

Notes:
Yale = an American university (that George Bush attended)
Simon and Garfunkel = a singing group
bright as a button = very clever

HOW TO WRITE A LIMERICK

You may assign students the task of writing a limerick. Use Zhenya’s Family Limericks as examples.

Or check out this Limerick handout by Leslie Opp-Beckman. She provides models, or templates, to make the writing easier for students.

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“Jagr Plays Hockey in Russia” — text and activity
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Below is a text about international ice hockey stars coming to Russia.

***
There is no NHL (National Hockey League) in the USA this year. Team owners and players cannot reach contract agreements. So, many players are coming (back) to Europe. Jaromir Jagr, a Czech Star, is, as of November 12, playing for Avangard in Omsk. Jagr, one of the NHL’s top players, is also the highest paid. His NHL salaray in 2003-2004 was 11 million. In Omsk he will earn between 1.6 and 2 million.

One stipulation of Jagr’s in playing in Russia was that he wear number 68, to commemorate the Prague Spring of 1968, when Warsaw Pact countries invaded Czechoslavakia. About Russia, Jagr says, “I have a lot of Russian friends. The last three summers, I’ve spent time there and the people were very nice to me. If I have an opportunity to play in the next best league in the world, of course I’m going to go.”

Many Russian stars have come back to play on their native soil (or ice). Alexander Frovlov is with CSKA in Moscow, Ilya and Kovalev and Nikolai Khabibulin are playing in Kazan.
***

Here are several steps teachers can take to use this text in class, and to gradually increase learners understanding of it

1. Write this two-column list on the board. They are word pairs. Ask students to predict which words will go together, one from each column.

Warsaw
team
contract
native
Hockey
highest
top

agreements
League
Pact
paid
player
owners
soil

2. Now ask students to predict what the article is about.

3. Next, Read the text aloud. Let students listen and check to see if they predicted the correct word pairs. (Hint: some words will pair with more than one word: e.g. “team” with “players” and “owners”).

Sources for Jagr text:
http://www.canoe.ca/Slam030321/col_francis-sun.html
http://www.thejournalnews.com/newsroom/031504/c0115uniformsweb.html
http://www.geocities.com/area51/1689/jagr/articles/jagr9903iyf.html

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Link: English Language Office, Russian Federation
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The English Language Office at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow offers all sorts of programs and resources in Russia. For more information click here.

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Events
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FEELTA (Far Eastern English Language Teachers Association) 8th Annual Winter Methodology School, January 20-22, 2005, Vladivostok
The FEELTA Winter Methodology School is a 3-day conference featuring seminars by local and native-speaking specialists.

Essay Contest: “I Discover America” on Hello-online.
What does America mean to you? Tell the story of your personal discovery, even if you’ve never been to America.
Deadline is December 31, 2004. Click on the above link to enter your essay.

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In the Next Issue
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on or around Dec 19, 2004. (Because of delays in publication, “ETs in Russia” will come out 3 times in December.)

“New Years Around the World”
“Language Learning Tips (Part I)”