This wordsearch puzzle is for Upstream Intermediate Unit 6, the topic is crime. Once again, I used www.armoredpenguin.com.

These crosswords are meant to help revising the vocabulary for Upstream Upper Intermediate Unit 4, the topic is Home. This unit really contains a lot of vocabulary, therefore I have two crosswords for these words. For making the crossword, I used this website: http://www.armoredpenguin.com/crossword/ and all the hints are taken from this dictionary: www.thefreedictionary.com, which really is an excellent dictionary.

Okay, I have been working with the essays my students wrote about "The Canterville Ghost" for some days now. My students were quite successful with the essays. However,  one thing was very surprising: a lot of my students spelled "ghost"  incorrectly! They were allowed to use the book and dictionaries, I found this error very curious. We'll have to go through it in class.
The discussion in class was rather lively; they were shocked with the way homosexuality was treated during those days. Some of the students found the book hopelessly old-fashioned and some enjoyed it, especially the ending. Most of them thought that the book was a humorous story, followed by a ghost story and a romantic story. Some of them said that they'll continue with reading "The Picture of Dorian Gray", which is wonderful. One of my students said that she had not read a book in 5 years and that this one was very enjoyable! I hope she'll read some more books now. For the next homereading book, I'll try to find something more recently published for variety.

This crossword is meant to revise vocabulary about health. It goes with Upstream Intermediate Unit 5. This one is for a weaker group, so the hints are in Estonian. I use this website for making crosswords http://www.armoredpenguin.com/crossword/ and I love it! My students like crosswords and this site is really easy to use. Here is the crossword and the key.

Environment: The Great White Shark

Here's a listening/watching activity to raise awareness about the great white sharks. I plan to use it with Unit 9, which is about environment, from Upstream B2+.

As a warmer, I plan to show this picture:

The picture is from https://www.facebook.com/ecovisionslc, a great page. We'll have a small discussion and then we will watch a clip from BBC. Depending on the group, I'd pre-teach the word fin. The video is available here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21719781 And here comes the whole activity:




Shark attack survivor campaigns to save great whites
Jonathan Kathrein was surfing on the California coast when he was attacked by a great white shark. The high school student battled to free his leg from the 12ft fish's jaws as it dragged him underwater.
Today, Mr Kathrein is fighting to save the same fish that nearly took his life.
Listen, watch and fill in the blanks. 

1. As Jonathan was watching his friend, his .................... hit something in the water. 2. He turned from going parallel to the beach to going in, and started...........................in. 3. Jonathan had the feeling that the shark would..............................................and swim off with it. 4. Sharks across the world are caught, pulled upon boats and their .................................................. Then they’re pushed..........................................................................alive. 5. Jonathan has learnt how much more we.............................them than they................us.

The expressions missing from the text are (in the correct order):
right hand
paddling
pull his leg off
fins are cut off
back into the water
hunt, hunt

I'll end this activity by discussing how much shark fin soup costs and highlighting the problem of the shark population decreasing.

Home reading: "The Canterville Ghost"

For home reading, I asked my students to read "The Canterville Ghost" by Oscar Wilde.  I chose this book because I enjoyed reading it when I was young and the text is easily available thanks to http://www.gutenberg.org/. I'll give the students a short lecture on Oscar Wilde, which should be quite interesting for them, as gay rights seems to be an important topic for my students. After that, I plan to have a small discussion in class, first in pairs and then with the whole group. I'll also ask my students to write an essay on the book (about 200 words, although they will probably write more). The questions I plan to include:

1. Discuss: what do you think of the book? Did you like it? Why/ why not? Was it easy to read?

2. "The Canterville Ghost" is...


•A romantic story
•Children’s story
•Ghost story
•Humorous story
•CHOOSE ONE, JUSTIFY YOUR ANSWER

3. Describe the atmosphere of the castle
•Describe the Otis family
•Is there a cultural clash?


I won't make the last question that explicit for stronger groups. By the end of this week, I'll have about 30 essays about "The Canterville Ghost". I'll post a short overview of how my plan worked then. 


We have this lovely statue in Estonia, Tartu. It's called Wilde and Vilde. Next to Oscar Wilde is sitting Eduard Vilde (1865-1933), who has been credited as the pioneer of critical realism in Estonian literature. I used the picture as a warmer in our literature class.

Listening activity: Ablisa

This is a gap filling listening task. I used a clip from the X Factor for this activity, it should be fun for the students and goes together with topics like music, friendship, TV shows, politeness.

The clip itself is available here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrNbLBS1D2Q

Depending on your group, you may want to go through the missing words before listening: 

shut up

judges

bubbly

old

best friends 

nervous

contestants

loud

stage

And here is the gap-filling task:

Ablisa’s X Factor Audition. Fill in the blanks!

Abby and Lisa are both really really...............................    .......................................... .............................................They want to get on the ..................... show their personalities and then hopefully, the ............................ will like them. Louie is an...........................man.  Abby and Lisa are............................... Lisa told the audience to................................. They have the worst attitude than any of the............................... Simon has met.

My students loved the topic and there was great discussion about reality TV shows after watching the clip.

Good luck with using it!