HOLLYWOOD in your ELT class via You Tube!

 

The holiday season is now over and we’re all back to our daily teaching routines for good! However, it’s always refreshing both for the students and us to find ways to take a break from the textbook!

Being a cinema lover myself and with the Oscars around the corner, I decided to create a lesson plan inspired by the glam and beauty of Hollywood so as to bring Film into my ELT class. Undeniably, You Tube was the handiest tool in order to achieve this.

Here is only a short intro of my outline. You can find and download the complete lesson plan for free in the right hand column of this blog (see flash_widget BOX).

Topic: ‘Hollywood Lovers’.

Level: Intermediate and above.

Time: Two 40’ sessions+ One 60’ minute session (for students’ presentations& comments).

Aim: To analyze movie trailers in depth, become familiar with different genres, write film reviews, and practise both critical and listening skills.

What you need: a computer, a projector and an Internet connection.

Movie Trailers used:

– ‘Troy’ (2004), http://bit.ly/S9Ht2p

– ‘Notting Hill’  (1999), http://bit.ly/Wb49NY

– ‘Snow white& the Huntsman’ (2012), http://bit.ly/uKivC8

– ‘Meet the Parents’ (2000), http://bit.ly/W2Yfkf

 

At the moment, You Tube is the top social video sharing site online. Here are some amazing facts and figures which caught my eye and I believe they are worthwhile mentioning:

  • As of February 2011, there are 490 million unique users worldwide per month!
  • More than 400 tweets per minute contain a YouTube link.
  • You Tube mobile gets over 100 million views a day.
  • You Tube is localized in 25 countries across 43 languages.

You Tube is a kind of window to the outside world and with its phenomenal popularity it can be used as a powerful, exciting educational tool. Students and especially teenagers absolutely love it! Even less tech-savvy teachers, who are more sceptical and reluctant to embrace educational technology, use it in their personal lives or are at least familiar with it. So why not give it a try in class too?

You Tube is free, rich in content, requires minimum IT skills from the part of the teacher and only basic IT school facilities. Below are some great tools you may also find useful while using You Tube:

  1. TubeChop allows you to easily chop the section you need from any YouTube video and share it.
  2. SafeShare.TV & ViewPure generate safe links and remove distracting and offensive elements around YouTube videos. SafesShare.TV also allows you to crop videos before sharing them.
  3. Listentoyoutube.com extracts the mp3 from any You Tube video of your choice. You only enter its URL and you instantly get your downloadable mp3!
  4. Teachertube.com is a channel designed to tend to teachers& learners digital needs featuring a big variety of educational videos.
  5.  You Tube for schools

Do you use You Tube in your class? If so, in what ways? How do your students respond to it? Do you have any other ideas on how to introduce Film effectively in your ELT lessons?

I look forward to hearing your ideas!

 All the best,

 Christina