8A Unit 1  Friends   Reading (Ⅰ) 

Teaching Objectives:

To guess general meanings from keywords and context

To skim text for overall meanings and scan for details

To identify specific information about different people form their friends’ descriptions

To use adjectives to describe people’s appearance and personalities

Teaching contents:

Words: slim, shoulder-length, generous, singer, almost, eyesight, smart, true

Phrases: travel around the world, have poor eyesight, have a good sense of humour, knock off, a true friend, say a bad word about anyone, vote for

Teaching preparations:

Tape recorder

Computer

Teaching procedures:

Step1 Leading-in   

T: Yesterday we learnt to talk about friends. Friends are very important in our lives. Almost everyone needs a friend and almost everyone has a friend, do you think so? Let’s look at some interesting English sayings about friends. Please try to guess the meanings of them.

Ss read and discuss.

Step 2 Presentation

T: Why do you think friends are important? What can friends do for you?

Ss give different answers.

T: Is your friend’s appearance very important to you?

Ss: No.

T: Good. We should never judge a person by his appearance or clothes. But it’ll be good for you to learn some words to describe your friends’ appearance, right?

T shows the pictures and teaches “shoulder-length”, “slim” and “poor eyesight”.

Step 3 Practice

Ss do Part B2, P9 individually. After checking the answers, T asks some Ss to give some more details about the appearance of each person in the pictures.

Step 4 Presentation

1. T: As you all think that appearance is not very important, could you tell me what is important in your opinion?

Ss answer with the adjectives they learnt to describe qualities, such as clean and tidy, helpful, honest, etc.

T: Excellent. Now I have some good friends here. Can you use some proper words to describe them?

Ss fill in the blanks to complete the sentences.

T teaches “generous”, “joke”, “humorous”, “have a good sense of humour”, “a true friend” and “be ready/ willing to do sth”.

2. T: ‘Teenagers’ magazine is holding a writing competition about good friends. Some students have written some entries for it. Please read and find out whether the following statements are true or false.

T plays the tape recorder for the Ss to repeat.

Ss read and do Part C1, P10.

3. Ss read again and do Part B1 on their own. Tell them that they need to look for specific details, which fit each of the persons described in the articles.

Step 5 Practice

1. Ss have a group competition by choosing to answer the questions about Betty in the table.

2. Fill in the blanks to complete the description about Max.

3. Complete the brief introduction about May.

Step 6 Summarize

T: What do we usually write about when we describe our friends?

Ss: Appearance, personalities …

T: Yes, in which paragraph do we usually write about the appearance?

Ss: Paragraph 1.

T: And in Paragraph 2?

Ss: Personalities.

T: Right. We also call it personalities. In the 3^rd paragraph we can write about their behaviors or future plans.

Step 7 Practice

1. Ss do Part C2, P10 and find out who each of the personalities will vote for and fill in the blanks. Then check the answers by asking and answering in pairs ‘Who will Amy/ Simon/ Sandy vote for?’

2. Ss vote for one of the ‘best friends’ described in the articles and tell the reason why.

3. Ss do a class vote for a ‘best friend’. Write a brief description about a person they consider as a best friend. Read some of the descriptions and then vote for one of them. Explain why they vote for that particular person.

Step 8 Homework

1.      Retell about the three best friends.

2.      Recommend a best student in your class and tell the reason why you vote for him or her.