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A Quickstep to the Movies
This page outlines a quickie lesson plan for writing a
movie review or
getting students ready to see any recent movie with a
critical eye.
For teachers and advanced students: How
to Annotate a YouTube video, using text bubbles,
titles, etc.
Target audience: high intermediate-advanced
ESOL learners
What you need:
Internet with a 56 Kbps minimum connection and a free
online video players, such as Windows
Media
Player, or QuickTime.
What to do:
1. Have your students
preview of some of the
vocabulary used in movie reviews: Go to Randall's ESL Cyber
Listening Lab
and select >Movie
Review in
the right-hand column (Difficult under
General Listening Quizzes); you might use the Basic
Listening Quiz about Movies in the
Medium category first). Students
listen to
the conversation about a movie while filling in the
blanks on some
questions. (See below Movies
and Language Practice for more listening
practice with movie's at
Randall's site.)
2. Go to Yahoo
Movies to check
out the >Critics
Reviews
of the selected movie (put the movie name in the
>Search Movies
box). You might want
to select one Critics Review on the high
side and one on the low side for your students to
read. Also decide if
the language/vocabulary of the reviews is
appropriate for your
students. All of the reviews link to a trailer of
the movie.
3. Have your students read at least one review and
watch the trailer
(see Resources
for Movies Online
below). You might put your students in groups to
each read a different review, report back, and
discuss the differences they
found. Have them copy the substance of their
feedback to a digital document to send to you or
have them
make a blog or podcast entry in their electronic
portfolio of this set of activities.
3. You may also be able to find an Alan Silverman
review with related
video or audio shows (and podcast capability) at Voice of America.
(Search
for
his
name, and then add the name of the movie.) Though
Silverman does
not write for lower level students, his reviews
include the names
of the major characters, a plot synopsis, and some
of the background of
the film, so it is good for more advanced readers
and writers. Students
can listen to a podcast of the show as
they read. This resource is especially useful if you
have found an older movie that might be free on a
video on demand service or in one of the Resources for
Movies Online
below.
4. Your students have by now collected enough
information to write a
good review, or to see the movie with at least some
idea of what they
will
be looking at. Below is a simple format to use for a
review. Please
feel free to copy this format and revise as you
wish.
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A quick format:
Name of the Movie
Reviewed by _________
Plot synopsis: [Summarize what happens in one-two
paragraphs, but try
not to give away the ending]
What was the best actor/actress/scene?
Did you enjoy this movie? Why or why not?
Your rating [could be A-F, 0-2 thumbs up, etc.] and
why:
[Even if you
didn't like the movie it might be very well done and
others might like
it.]
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Follow-up:
Students might
- Read the book the movie was based on
- Write a script for a scene that was "left out"
of the
movie
- Act out the script for the new scene
- Act out a scene from the movie but in a
different
time or culture
- Create a multimedia presentation about the
movie and
its significance
- Watch the movie together (over several classes
if
needed), and discuss it using the reviews that
they read
- Etc. (don't forget the popcorn)
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RESOURCES FOR
MOVIES ONLINE
iTunes Movie
Trailers
Has links to trailers at the major movie sites, without
lesson plans.
HD-Trailers.net
Mostly very recent movies; allows you to download the
trailers (select Play
first). (You may need to wait
for the whole trailer to load and then replay it, as it
takes a lot of
bandwidth.)
Internet
Moving
Image Archive
Contains over 3,000 feature length films out of copyright,
usually in B
& W and running around an hour, as well as Open Source
Movies, TV
shows, news programs, ads, etc.
Search for more reviews, interviews with stars, trailers,
movie news, etc.
How to
annotate YouTube videos using YouTube's tools online.
Movies and Language Practice
Listening
at English Online France
Glenda Hanson's English On-Line site has a several trailers
with
accompanying exercises in her Listening section.
Scroll down to find Movie Trailers.
Randall's
ESL
Cyber
Listening
Lab
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Last
updated 3 May 2017; copyright
Elizabeth
Hanson-Smith (with many thanks to Aiden Yeh for
suggesting many parts
of this lesson plan in an e-mail 2 October 2002)
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