National heroes in classroom!
Post date: Mar 01, 2011 5:47:41 PM
1st of March and the first short intercultural project was completed! After reading about Robin Hood at the English lesson, the pupils had to prepare a short presentation about their National hero and I had to prepare a presentation about Greek National heroes. When both presentations finished, the pupils divided into two groups. The first group had to write a small paragraph with information about Slovak National hero and the other one had to write about Greek National heroes.
Here is some of this information:
National Slovak hero: Juraj Jánošík- he has been the main character of many Slovak legends, novels, poems, and films
- he was born shortly before his baptism on January 25, 1688
- he was a poor boy and he lived in small house in the quiet village of Terchová in the present-day Žilina District in northwestern Slovakia
- he became the leader of a forest robber group at the age of 23
- most of the victims of this robber group were rich merchants
- the members of this group shared their loot with the poor
- he wore a big hat, a miraculous belt, white blouse and trouser, leather boots and he had an axe
- he was sentenced to death on March 17, 1713
National Greek heroes: I tried really hard to choose only one Greek hero, so I find it useful to present more than one…
Digenis Akritas
- one of the most important hero in Greek traditional songs
- he was fighting against enemies at the borders
- he was stronger than anyone else, even from the Death, according to the myth
Alexander the Great
- he was born in Pella in 356 BC
- he was king of Macedonia, a Greek region
- he was one of the greatest Generals in World History
- he conquered many countries until his death on 323 BC
- he created many Greek cities worldwide with the name Alexandria
- his horse name was Voukefalas
Heroes of the Greek revolution (1821)
- Androutsos, Diakos, Kolokotronis, Kanaris, Botsaris, Bouboulina
- Greece owes its freedom to these great heroes who fought against Ottoman Empire
At the last hour, I had a great time with smaller pupils with whom I talked about babies! What babies eat, what they like, what parents can do with babies and where they can go together… It was so nice because pupils weren’t shy at all. Instead they actively participated during the lesson by asking questions, giving answers and raising their hands most of the time! Because of pupil’s excitement, at the last ten minutes of the lesson, we played a game with questions concerning different rooms/ places of the house, such as kitchen, living room, bathroom and garden.
Do you want to play this game? Ok, here are the instructions:
1. Draw a table with four columns at the board (or as many as you like!)
2. Write on the top of each column the name of the room/ place of the house (e.g. kitchen, living room, bathroom, garden)
3. Ask your pupils to think about activities that they do at each room/ place (What can we do in… e.g. the kitchen?)
4. Write down on the board the pupil’s answers using bullet points – pupil’s brainstorming (e.g. kitchen: make a cake)
5. When there aren’t any more answers by the pupils, proceed to the next column
6. When you finish writing the activities, give 2-3 minutes to your pupils to work in pairs by doing questions and giving answers (e.g. pupil A: What are you doing in the kitchen?, pupil B: I am making a cake.)
7. After 2-3 minutes ask random questions to each pupil (e.g. What are you doing in the living room?, What are you doing in the garden? etc.). You can also take the advantage to ask questions that you have already taught to your pupils, such as: What is your name?, How old are you?, Where are you living? Where are you from? etc. It is important to make random questions in order the pupils to stay alert and pay attention during the whole activity.
Veľa šťastia! (Good luck!)
