Cartoon Videos in Business and Financial English

With all the hullabaloo going on in Europe, Greece first and now Italy plus wherever's next by the time this post is actually published... because according to my students it was always going to be a W recession and now that the Euro is sinking fast, Friedmann-type prophecies threaten, whispers of deflation scatter, so  thought I'd better get on with posting up this interesting video I've done with my own ESP:Financial adult learners.

My own lesson plan with a Pre-intermediate group was based on taking the vocabulary presented in Ian MacKenzie's book, Financial English, and turning it into something a wee bit more exciting & communicative, ensuring that the vocabulary included some stickiness and of course, making it somewhat easier-to-swallow.

So...
a) we watched the video
b) did the exercise 6.10
c) watched the video again and discussed it for merit and content
d) got them to explain inflation and deflation
e) reviewed the questions on 6.10
d) talked through European periods of inflation and deflation
e) they created their own Powerpoint slides of the vocabulary in 6.10 (in exercise and text)

Would you have done this lesson any differently?

What other ways could this video (or the ones below) be used?

Best,Karenne




More Cartoon Videos for Business English (a playlist)










Useful links related to this posting: 
Business English Cartoons (Youtube link to the ones shown above)
The Dilbert channel on Youtube
Business English Pod
More video websites for Business English 
More Financial English tips

Videos for Valentine's Day

I'm sure you've all got your Valentine's Day lessons sorted but just in case you're looking for a nice video to use in class on Friday/Monday as conversation starters...

Here are a few of my favorites plus an old one I made for a friend:



6 Billion Others
This beautiful video actually inspired one of my students to download and mash-up into a new version for his brother's wedding, adding interviews from the rest of his family on what love means.














The Break-up
Satirical look at marketing practices in 2010 - a good one to show to Business students who you perhaps don't want to do something mushier with.

















Valentine's Day, the trailer
Cheese. Pure cheese. Use with teenagers.

















Ah, L'Amour
A short, sweet and engaging film on modern love.

















Plenty of Fish
Um, yea. I made this last year for a friend who got divorced after 15 years of marriage and was my way of cheering her up.  It's actually a poem so if you read it aloud, you'll have more fun with it than just watching! :-)















More videos

• What is love? (series on The Big Think)
• How to Flirt (How stuff works)
• How to find your soul mate (by Guy Kawasaki - yea, the entrepreneur guru)
• Up in the air (movie trailer)
• The JK Wedding Dance  
• Parisan Love, a search story (hat tip Anne Hodgson) 
• I don't like flowers (a video activity, Jamie Keddie)

Each video chosen should be significantly poignant that it will generate conversations, dogme 2.0 style, in your lessons so I've not added any questions of my own, however, here are some useful links:

• Ozge's list of tech tools and tips for Valentine's Day
• Lesson Activities for Valentine's Day  
• Larry Ferlazzo's Best Sites to learn about Valentine's Day
• Breaking News, Valentine's Day Lesson Plan
• ESL handouts, advanced lesson plan
• Free English Lessons Online 
• ESL Handouts (scroll all the way down to download)
• GuardianWeekly: The languages of love
• FoxNews: Beauties and their boy toys

Best,
Karenne

p.s. Did you find or create a material / read or write a blog post for teachers with ideas for Valentine's day?  Don't hesitate to add the link below.

p.p.s. Not to be all bah-humbugie (that was Christmas, right) but ya kno' I, personally, despite having gotten married on Valentine's Day myself, think it's all a bit materialistic and plastic.  What do you think?    In Ecuador, they made the day a celebration of friendship too and I quite liked that!  So... dear readers, Happy Valentine's!

Conversations at Christmas

Confession:

Christmas is not my favorite holiday.

It's my least favorite.

To go into all the reasons for that would be dull...

I could say I don't like the materialism, am not a big fan of shopping or crowded markets - suffer from glühwein headaches... I could tell you I hate the cold: Christmas for me, growing up in the Caribbean, was about playing cricket on the beach, picnic'd turkey on Boxing Day.

Everyone wants it to snow here. Sssh.

Also, all those expectations to be happy. All that pressure to "let's make everything perfect."

And how exactly did Coca-Cola manage to influence everyone into thinking that a big fat man in a white beard brings gifts down a chimney and more importantly how did this concept shimmey it's way into every little boy and girl's dreams all over the world?

Bah, humbug I say.

But in the meantime, here's a little gift for you and your classes over the next 10 days:

Merry Christmas
;-)

Best,
Karenne
p.s. for the new year

Related Links:

• Youtube Xmas songs +lyrics
• 12 days of Christmas, Sue Lyon-Jones (YL)
• Lots of Christmas Stuff Isabel Perez Torres
• Six topical teaching ideas for December, Lindsay Clandfield
• More questions at Christmas, Sean Banville

& if you've also done a lesson on this theme... do add your link!

Free Conversation Lesson, New Year 2009

Back to classes so soon?

Back to energizing, inspiring and motivating, getting our students talking in English...

Did you just sigh?

Tsk, tsk. ;-)

Here's a nice freebie for you, a speaking skills lesson, it should provide at least enough material for the first two classes this year!

New Year 2009


Enjoy - some of the answers to the questions in the SimplyQuestTM will be quite surprising!

Best,
Karenne

p.s. You can also pick up a song activity based on Abba's Happy New Year ballad, that's the previous posting, (here.)

Happy New Year, by Abba

Have you realized how poignant that old favorite, sung by Abba way back when, is?

Ideal for taking into class with you at the beginning of term.

Here's a quick little exercise that you can print off and drag in as an ice-breaker or warmer.

Instructions

• distribute sheet
  
• tell class to fill in as much of the blanks as they can, then
  
• play song, first time straight through without stopping
• get them to check with each other and compare answers
• play song, second time stopping after each sentence
• compare answers
• discuss key vocabulary
• discuss meaning of the song and 'the time' it was sung in

SimplyConversations Extension

• the gap fill basically works on a 'lexical chunk' system in order for you (your students) to pay particular attention to the way words group together. If you're working with a group of fairly fluent and motivated students you can also use this activity as a philosophical discussion tool. ABBA sung this pre-internet, pre-a lot of other things and older students who were around when this was a hit will have much to add to the pot.
  

Video of this song


The official ABBA site has a gorgeous video with lyrics on screen. That's here.
More songs related to the new year on youtube here.


Useful links related to this posting:

• Song meanings here, Song facts here.
• Download video on to your laptop, blog about that here.
• Netbooks, blog about that here.

Do you have any suggestions or comments? Don't hesitate to add your thoughts below.

Best,
Karenne