Skills and Strategies in focus:
Reading an authentic text, highlighting key points, and verbally summarizing
Listening: Listening to an authentic audio text; listening to an oral summary of a text
Speaking: Speaking about emotion using adjective clauses and relative pronouns
Pronunciation:
Age & Level: 17-23 | International students at the IEC | CEFR Levels B1/B2
Length of Lesson: 90 Minutes
Materials Needed: Copy of written text, space in classroom to organize students into two concentric circles or two lines, an internet connection, speakers, an authentic audio or video sharing an immigrant experience.
Students will:
Be able to read an authentic text and summarize the article.
Be able to listen to and understand a summary of the article.
Be able to highlight the key points of an article.
Be able to summarize and describe the points of an article in decreasingly limited time periods
Be able to listen to and understand an authentic audio story.
Be able to answer questions in detail about the story they heard.
Be able to discuss and make connections to the story in light of their own experiences.
Time: 20 minutes
NOTE:
Prior to this class students have had a unit on immigration. They would have been given this short article about two situations related to immigration and the accompanying study questions.
Activity: 3-2-1 Cog: “How to Foster Empathy for Immigrants” by Jeremy Adam Smith
Steps:
Describe the activity: Tell Ss that they will form two lines
Give students a few minutes to review the text that they were given during the previous class. Do they have questions about anything? Vocab questions: what is GOP? Polarization? Revulsion?
Count off students into twos; each group (ones and twos) form a line. Let them know that the ones will start first summarizing the article in 3 minutes, 2 minutes, and then 1 minute. Let them know what the timer sounder is going to be, so they’ll know to continue talking until they hear the buzzer, indicating the time is over.
Ss talk for 3 minutes.
Ss talk for 2 minutes
Ss talk for 1 minute
Now reverse roles: those who were speaking are now listening and those who were listening are now speaking.
Ss talk for 3 minutes
Ss talk for 2 minutes
Ss talk for 1 minute
Pair and share. Have students share their understanding of the article with a partner.
Whole class shares their understanding of the article, with each group reporting in on their understanding. If time, they can share opinions of the article.
Get feedback on the activity.
Audio Text: Returning to Myself, (start at 1:28)
Time: 60 minutes
Activity: Listen to an authentic audio recording by a Dreamer, Returning to Myself, by Kiara Chavez
Steps:
Tell students that they’ll be listening to a story “Returning to Myself” read by an undocumented student, Kiara Chavez. Review a few key terms they may not know, such as DACA, (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals). Let them know they’ll have to answer specific questions about the story after they've listened to it twice. They can take notes if they’d like. Prepare them for the fact that this is an audio only and they won’t be able to rely on written or visual cues to help them out. https://www.motustheater.org/motus-monologues-podcast.
Play the first half of the audio (about 4 minutes).
Do some comprehension checks, asking specific questions.
Play the second half of the audio (about 4 minutes).
Do some comprehension checks, asking specific questions.
Play the whole audio again.
False facts dictation: Read the text below for the first half of the audio and have students call out when they hear a statement that isn’t true.
Kiara Chavez returned to Guatemala to visit her grandmother. She was eighteen years old when she made this journey. As an undocumented person living in the United States, she was able to travel through the Advanced Parole program, which gives DACA [Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals] recipients permission to leave the country for study abroad, employment, or humanitarian reason. She was going because her grandmother was dying. She traveled by plane with other DACA recipients. Kiara was guaranteed re-entry into the United States.
Post-listening Activity
Time: 10 minutes
Activity: Personalized discussion.
Steps:
Pose a variety of questions to generate meaningful discussion.
Have you ever made an important journey like the one Kiara made? What do you think is the most important trip you've taken?
How would it feel to not be able to visit a sick relative?
What is the scariest journey you've ever taken?
What's the most inspiring place you've visited?
What events in your life have helped you understand more about yourself, your family, or your culture?
Have you ever been prohibited from going somewhere? How did you feel?
What about Kiara's experience can you identify with?
What do you think the title of the story means: “Returning to Myself?
Feedback
Time: 5 minutes
Activity: Get feedback from students
What did you like about this activity? What did you dislike?
Did you find this easy or difficult?
What was most difficult?
What did you think of Kiara’s story?
References: https://www.motustheater.org/motus-monologues-podcast
Why did a group of fourth graders rally in support of an undocumented classmate while the citizens of Murrieta, California, tried to stop immigrant children from entering their town?
Appendix A: "How to Foster Empathy for Immigrants," by Jeremy Adam Smith, adapted and edited from https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_foster_empathy_immigrants.
Appendix B: Returning to Myself Transcript