Midterm 

All the tasks will be conducted in Zoom with the teacher during the classes. Here is the link: ....

However, if you miss the class, you are supposed to do them by yourself and send to the teacher. 

Welcome to the web quest

Title: Ted conference 

Imagine that you have been invited to participate in Ted talk conference. You have been given a list of the most relevant issues which you can prepare presentations about. You should draw the attention of the publicity to the problem, attract potential investors and offer your own solution. Presenting the problem to the audience and persuading people can be really difficult. That is why this quest is the chance to get familiar with public speaking, certain rules, etc. 

The entire quest helps to accomplish certain goals:

• • • processing information and its summarizing;

    • conveying this information to the other people;

    • Using and describing infographics correctly;

    • Persuading people; 

    • Developing your public speaking skills. 

The training process will be organized in pair work. You are supposed to divide the topics among yourselves and prepare a presentation devoted to this topic. Also your presentations should be supported by Infographics (found or created by yourself) which demonstrates the statistics and confirms the existence and importance of the problem. 

Mind that you will have 10 min for your presentation and 5 min for answering your listeners’ questions. When you are not presenting, ask questions about other group’ problems. I will ask you to listen carefully and take notes because you will have to write a summary of  one of your colleagues’ at the end of the class. 

Process: 

1. Choose the topic for your presentation and discuss it with colleagues. Explain the choice of the topic. 

The list of topics: 

1. Bullying – why students bully each other and how we can stop bullying at schools and universities?

2. Endangered languages – should we save them or move on? 

3. Many students now study for marks, not for knowledge. Is it possible to boost their motivation and make them interested in the subject itself rather than in the marks they get? 

4. Teachers experience more stress and anxiety than other workers, study shows. What can we do to decrease anxiety and stress in this profession?

5. Nowadays lots of students lack motivation in studying foreign languages due to tiredness and not having native speakers around. What can we do to solve this problem?

2. Using the following materials, write a short description of the chosen problem and send it to the teacher; discuss it in the class (first drafts). 

Materials: 

• https://www.britannica.com/topic/bullying 

• https://www.unicef.org/parenting/child-care/bullying 

• https://www.edweek.org/leadership/the-state-of-bullying-in-schools-in-charts/2023/08 

• https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/22/learning/endangered-languages-are-worth-saving.html 

• https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/16/linguists-language-culture-loss-end-of-century-sea-levels-rise 

• https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/article/saving-dying-disappearing-languages-wikitongues-culture 

• https://www.britannica.com/story/why-do-languages-die 

• https://hbsp.harvard.edu/inspiring-minds/why-focusing-on-grades-is-a-barrier-to-learning 

• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9518388/ 

• https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/global-mental-health/article/teacher-stress-anxiety-and-depression-at-the-beginning-of-the-academic-year-during-the-covid19-pandemic/5753CEFCBF84FB5F7621042C56D47554 

• https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1274645.pdf 

3. Using the following tools, create/ choose infographics devoted to the problem and send it to the teacher. 

Tools: 

• YequalX.com 

• Google Jamboard  

• Google таблицы 

• Microsoft Word 

4. Redraft existing versions of the problems' descriptions written earlier. Complete them with necessary information.  

5. Presentation 

Tools: 

• Powerpoint 

• Google presentations 

• Miro 

• Prezi 

6. Write a summary about one of your colleagues’ presentations. You should use the plan discussed in the class, as well as the vocabulary and grammar constructions from previous classes. Write no more than 250 words.