Infonews n°331 from 27/04/2008

A la Une this week, let's discover sites about Fair Trade to prepare Fair Trade Day on May 10th, then some sites about the Olympic games and some old and new ones around the film Bowling for Columbine. Primary school teachers will discover a new eTwinning tool kit and resources to download from the British Council website, and secondary school teachers a site of poetry and two about the delegates in the US elections. Finally, several reviews of the animation film Persepolis whose British version is released this week-end, a tutorial to learn how to use subtitles and some articles about how the teachers' strike was perceived in the UK and where you can learn how to say "facilitateur d'apprentissage" in English...
I hope you had or still have nice holidays. Here in Rouen it's a nice spring day, the sun is shining and the lilies of the valley are blooming....

Have a nice week!
Christine Reymond

Sommaire

A la Une : Fair Trade

What is fair trade?
Fair Trade Day on May 10th
Teachers' Resources
Magazines
Films from Fair Games
Quizzes
Games
Sports
Fair Trade Travel

Olympic Games

Beijing official site
Official Olympic Committee site
Protests

Bowling for Columbine

Michael Moore's site
Comprehension exercises and other activities
Links to go further

Resources for Primary School

"How to say thank you" Project
Resources to download (from the British Council)

Resources for Secondary School

NewsHour Extra: Poetry (from [LII New This Week] April 24)
Democratic Super Delegate Tracker (from [LII New This Week] April 24)
Democratic National Convention: How to Become a Delegate (from [LII New This Week] April 24)

Film Reviews

Persepolis

Internet tools

Subtitles

Teaching Practice

Teacher's strike in the UK


A la Une : Fair Trade

What is fair trade?

You can start your study of the theme with those sites : the last is a .pdf FAQ page.
http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/coolplanet/kidsweb/fairtrade/index.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_trade
http://www.fairtraderesource.org/downloads/fair_trade_faq.pdf

Fair Trade Day on May 10th

"On May 10, 2008, communities in 70 countries will mark Fair Trade Day and highlight the importance and benefits of Fair Trade for people and the planet."
http://fairtradefederation.org/ht/d/sp/i/208/pid/208
http://www.fairtraderesource.org/wftd-08/
http://www.fairtraderesource.org/uploads/2008/03/wftd_2008_500x306.jpg

Teachers' Resources

from Fair Trade
http://www.fairtraderesource.org/wftd-08/fair-trade-toolkit/
from Oxfam
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/education/resources/milking_it/milkingit/teachers/how_to_use.htm
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/education/resources/category.htm?30
Reports and articles to reflect and debate
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6426417.stm
http://www.newint.org/issue322/contents.htm
http://us.oneworld.net/section/us/perspectives/6/fairtrade
Tools to teach fair trade (with several links)
http://www.fairtraderesource.org/change-the-world/educate-about-fair-trade/
from the Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/fairtrade

Magazines

Ethical Consumers (buy different products)
http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/
Just Things (you can download the magazines)
http://justthings.info/
Ode Magazine ( interesting article about the new drive-thru)
http://www.odemagazine.com/doc/
http://www.odemagazine.com/doc/52/not-the-same-old-drive-thru/
Time Magazine : Fair Trade Fashion
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1594126,00.html

Films from Fair Games

Watch Fairgames : 2 ads based on the Sims2 and World of Warcraft to make teens aware of the problem. (I found it difficult to understand, but maybe my students will understand it better. Try with students level B1+ who know the games and can explain it to you!)
http://fairgame.strangecompany.org/film/list
A video presenting a project from a micro-credit company, plus several portraits ( site also available in French)
http://www.oikocredit.org/site/en/

Quizzes

11 questions to discover how much you know about fair trade ( site also available in French)
http://www.oikocredit.org/fairtrade/en/doc.phtml?p=fairtrade_quiz_en

Games

A role playing game level B1+ (excellent for students studying economics): "The aim of this game is to help the participants understand how trade influences the development of a country and to create interest and discussion about the world trading system in an enjoyable and non-academic way."
http://www.oikoumene.org/?id=4195
Another simpler game including basic math, level A2. Here is how to play:
http://www.globalfootprints.org/pdf/fairtradenum56.PDF
Cowsequence, an interactive Flash game to compare the life of farmers in Jamaica and wales. Level A2+
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/education/resources/milking_it/milkingit/activities/cowsequence_flash.htm
A comic in Flash from the BBC, level A1+ to raise young students' awareness
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/citizenx/internat/global/animation.shtml
A regular snake and ladders board game, for young children, and another one with pictures adapted to the fair trade theme
http://www.globalconnections.org.uk/default/cms.asp?categoryid=126
http://www.newint.org/issue322/camels.htm
A game designed by a 13 year old girl for a competition : "The DubbleClick competition was launched in March 2007 and challenged people to come up with a game that inspired players to get on the case for Fairtrade and help change the world, chunk by chunk! Fairtrade guarantees a fair deal for farmers in developing countries, so they can cover their costs and have a decent standard of living. The winner, Grace Conium, had her game, Choca Monkey, turned into a real game by professional games designers at Atticmedia. " (a game with several level, but not much English)
http://www.dubbleclick.co.uk/

Sports

Fair Trade soccer : "One way of helping people understand how global trade rules put some countries at a disadvantage is by organizing a metaphorical soccer game modeled on the
rules and dynamics of global trade."
http://www.fairtradesports.com/wp-content/images/pdfs/OxfamSoccerGame.pdf

Fair Trade Travel

This is a new concept emerging under different form here are some sites to discover it and compare.
http://www.fairtradefederation.org/ht/d/sp/i/210/pid/210
http://www.tribes.co.uk/
http://www.responsibletravel.com/Wholesaler/Wholesaler100007.htm (with a list of responsibilities)
http://www.maketravelfair.com/
Watch also these videos on you tube about "responsible tourism"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-upm3QQYhw&feature=related
and this news report from New Zealand about sustainable development
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVECSfLczL0&feature=related
Global Exchange Reality Tours
http://www.globalexchange.org/tours/

Olympic Games

Beijing official site

As for each games, the official website offers lots of resources that can be used in class. You can :
- study the relay of the flame (from the official point of view)
http://torchrelay.beijing2008.cn/en/
- discover the pages for tourists, with a city guide of Beijing, the places to visit, the shopping, the hotel, the food, etc. and even the weather
http://en.beijing2008.cn/spectators/beijing/
- discover the symbols, the logos, the mascots
http://en.beijing2008.cn/spirit/symbols/
- learn Chinese and English from French : there you can hear and repeat simple sentences in the three languages
http://en.beijing2008.cn/languagecorner/
- study the sports : In the "sports and venues" section, you access a page with a moving banner presenting logos for all the sports. You click on it and you get information about the sport : the history, the rules, the sportsmen, the venues and the events. For the last Olympic games, I asked a class of A2+ students to read these pages and present the sports to the class. We all learnt a lot! For example, here is the page about modern pentathlon. In the "competition" box on the top right, you can access a list of all the sports : 35! Enough for a whole class!
http://en.beijing2008.cn/cptvenues/sports/modernpentathlon/index.shtml

Official Olympic Committee site

with links to the sites of Beijing, Vancouver in 2010, London in 2012 and Sochi 2014
http://www.olympic.org/uk/index_uk.asp
and pages about all the sports:
http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/calendars/calendar_sports_uk.asp

Protests

The Olympic games have several times been a forum for political protests : here is an audio file and script from NPR presenting the events everyone remembers in 1936, 1968, 1972, 1980. Level A2+.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=19120192
More about the Civil disobedience of 1968 (to be also linked to MLK, the Civil Rights Movement and the Black Power.)
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/summer-olympics-mexico-city.html
and read this BBC article about the long history of Olympic protests (B1+)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7334362.stm
Read also this article from the Swedish site "Resistance Studies" entitled : "Olympic Games : the next arena for global protest?"
http://resistancestudies.org/?p=301
And here is the site "Free Tibet"
http://www.freetibet.org/

Bowling for Columbine

This film is very often used in class to teach about gun control. Some parts, like the scene in the bank, can be used with students level A2, and the issue is obviously in the cultural themes of upper secondary school in France ( living together, revolt).

Michael Moore's site

On his site, Michael Moore offers a teaching guide to read online or download, (On e-teach, Monique Mirza says that it is rich, varied and very efficient for "branching out".)
http://www.bowlingforcolumbine.com/library/teachers/index.php
a timeline of US support to violence from 1950 to 2000 corresponding to a part of the film in the "what a wonderful world" section,
http://www.bowlingforcolumbine.com/library/wonderful/index.php
and 4 videos : the famous cartoon from the South Park : "a brief history of America", a short scene from the film (at the bank), an interview of Marilyn Manson (the singer) and of Matt Stone (an ex-student reflecting on his days at school (level B2) )
http://www.bowlingforcolumbine.com/media/clips/index.php

Comprehension exercises and other activities

You can find in Michelle Henry's pages links to several sites that you can use around this film : the script, gap filling exercises, comprehension exercises, and a power point about bullying.
http://www.ac-nancy-metz.fr/enseign/anglais/Henry/cinema2.htm#bowl
You can also find videos and gap fillings exercises on this page by our colleagues from Rouen LP
http://anglais-lp.ac-rouen.fr/activites/activites_fichiers/VIOLENCE/ViolenceINDEX.htm

Links to go further

Starting from Mickael Moore's home page, I also found:
- an action guide, with a link to a site created by his father in memory of Daniel Mauser, a boy who was killed in the Columbine massacre, with the aim of changing the law, which he managed partially
http://www.bowlingforcolumbine.com/involved/index.php
http://www.danielmauser.com/initiative.html
- a link to the Brady Campaign aiming at "closing the gun show loophole" because : " The Brady Law requires criminal background checks of gun buyers at licensed dealers, but there is a loophole at gun shows. Convicted felons, domestic violence abusers, and those who are dangerously mentally ill can walk into any gun show and buy weapons from unlicensed sellers without being stopped, no questions asked. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold got two shotguns, an assault rifle and a TEC-9 assault pistol from private sellers at gun shows. "(from the site)
- this site also offers a poster that you can download and an interactive map of the massacres since 1997, with the date a description of each. The dots are so numerous and close together that you may prefer download the complete list, or just the list of school shootings. And you will discover that there has been 15 school shooting since January 2008 only!
http://www.bradycampaign.org/
http://www.bradycampaign.org/xshare/pdf/facts/god-bless-poster2006.pdf
http://www.bradycampaign.org/facts/highprofile/
Then you can go on to a debate about gun control, using this page created by Laurence Bernard from Martinique which includes several work-sheets.
http://absolutenglish.free.fr/spip.php?article8

Resources for Primary School

"How to say thank you" Project

This Tool Kit for intercultural communication is provided by eTwinning and can be a very useful source of inspiration to build a simple, communicative and inter-cultural project with primary school children:
http://www.etwinning.net/ww/en/pub/etwinning/ideas_and_practice/project_kits/intercultural_dialogue/how_do_i_say_thank_you.htm
you can also find ideas in the other kits:
http://www.etwinning.net/ww/en/pub/etwinning/ideas_and_practice/project_kits.htm
and of course, you can use the site to promote your own project, find partners or just join an ongoing project.
http://www.etwinning.net/ww/en/pub/etwinning/index2006.htm

Resources to download (from the British Council)

In its April newsletter, the British Council offers several useful resources to help young children learn English : songs, pronunciation kits, flash cards. All this material is meant for home use, but can be also very useful in primary school. Here is their description : "Don't forget that there are new downloads on LearnEnglish Parents each month, and this month you will find the latest version of Pron Pal to download - listen to words and phrases about numbers and practise saying them with your child. There are also sound files and sheet music to a song about pirates. You will have to register to get to the latest downloads page - but they are all free! "
http://www.britishcouncil.org/parents-downloads.htm

Resources for Secondary School

NewsHour Extra: Poetry (from [LII New This Week] April 24)

This NewsHour with Jim Lehrer special for children provides a collection of material on poetry. Features contemporary poet profiles (with biographies, poems, and video clips), reports on poetry slams and performance poetry, submitted poems by students from around the world, poetry lesson plans, and links to related sites.
http://lii.org/cs/lii/view/item/25926

Democratic Super Delegate Tracker (from [LII New This Week] April 24)

"Who are the Democratic super delegates? These nearly 800 Democratic party leaders and officials, who may vote independently of their state's primary or caucus results, will comprise 20 percent of the total delegate pool at the 2008 nominating convention. In this year's tight race, their flexible votes may determine the Democratic presidential candidate." (from PBS News Hour)
The newsletter LII New This Week from April 24 recommends this PBS site presenting those people who can change the elections until the last minute.
http://lii.org/cs/lii/view/item/25940
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/vote2008/primaries/superdelegates/search.php

Democratic National Convention: How to Become a Delegate (from [LII New This Week] April 24)

"This site answers the question "How do you become a delegate to the 2008 Democratic National Convention?" Features an overview of the types of delegates: district-level, at-large, add-on, and party leaders and elected official (PLEO). Some of the add-on and PLEO delegates are unpledged, and are known as super delegates in the media. Also includes an interactive delegate map, and a link to the 2008 delegate selection rules. From the Democratic National Convention Committee." (from LII New This Week)
http://lii.org/cs/lii/view/item/25941
http://www.demconvention.com/how-to-become-a-delegate/

Film Reviews

Persepolis

This week-end is the UK release of the English version of the animation film Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi that many of us saw this winter in France. Here are several reviews with lots of useful vocabulary for students in literature. The Sunday Times liked it : "this is pop culture’s equivalent of Dr Zhivago: a big, beautifully woven tale of the personal and the political."
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/film_reviews/article3805199.ece
and so did the Guardian, the Observer (comparing its impact to Art Spielgelman's with the Maus) and the Telegraph. You can compare those reviews to the Sun's short article, the Sneak : "if you are looking to expand your grey matter in the cinema this weekend then Persepolis is your best hope."
http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Guardian_Film_of_the_week/0,,2275907,00.html
http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Observer_Film_of_the_week/0,,2276441,00.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/04/26/bfjenny126.xml
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/showbiz/film/article1086605.ece

Internet tools

Subtitles

On e-teach, I discovered that our colleague Stéphane Busuttil has made a page to help us learn how to use the subtitles in class : how to download them, and how to adapt them to a film you have. With his tips, you can for example download the script of a film and avoid the painful transcription of the sequence you want to use, and do many other things. Don't miss these very useful pages. They are in French, but the links lead to pages in English where you can also find tutorials and help.
http://stephane.busuttil.free.fr/tutoriels/tutoriels_audiovideo_seubtaiteulz_01.htm

Teaching Practice

Teacher's strike in the UK

Read this surprisingly hard critic of the strike in The Times:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/education/article3821282.ece
Here is an article from the Independent where you can find, in a comment to the article, the key words of modern teaching : 'enablers of learning', Key Skills, Key Skills folder.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/04/26/do2602.xml
from the BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/7367471.stm
from the Press Association
http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5g5fKmtgpe9dz4xTiwLPb6lMYkDQg


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