Group Members: Nihan Sanic, Zeynep Sinan, & Nataliya Spirydovich

A Dinner With a Star!

Let your imagination run wild! Design your own quirky characters—pick their looks, traits, and backstories. Ready to see what they can do? It’s just a click away! Get ready to level up your skills, and have a blast doing it!

Objectives: 

Students will be able to...

1. engage in spoken interaction through creative, celebrity-themed role-plays, enhancing fluency and conversational skills;

2. improve listening for detail by noting down specific information from a video interview;

3. use the Reported Speech by discussing celebrities’ lives;

4. use AI tool (Character AI) to facilitate learning.

Target Skills: 

• Speaking and Listening (primary focus)

• Grammar (secondary focus)

CEFR Level: B2 / Upper-intermediate

CEFR Competencies:

• Receptive Skills: Students will engage in listening activities that require them to extract and interpret information.

• Productive and Interactive Skills: Students will create their own questions and engage in speaking activities, thereby producing language in both planned and spontaneous interactions.

Age: 17-19

Materials: Character AI Website or App; student handouts

Procedure

1. Lead-in (3 minutes): Students work in pairs: Read the quotes. What do they tell you about fame? Do you agree or disagree?

• “I don't think I could think of a single thing that's more isolating than being famous.” -Lady Gaga

• “The strangest part about being famous is you don't get to give first impressions anymore. Everyone already has an impression of you before you meet them.” -Kristen Stewart

• “There aren't many downsides to being rich, other than paying taxes and having relatives asking for money. But being famous, that's a 24 hour job right there.” -Bill Murray

2. Pre-Speaking (5-8 minutes):

a) Set the context and generate interest:  Do you follow any celebrities, especially Taylor Swift? You will watch a fast-paced video with her. Watch the video and fill-in the blanks. Don't worry about understanding everything—focus on key phrases and ideas. 

Video: [4:00–5:25]. https://youtu.be/XnbCSboujF4?t=240

It might be helpful to divide it into two shorter segments (1 minute each) with a 30-second pause between, allowing students to process and jot down notes.

*Optional: Fill-in-the-blanks activity 

Provide a handout with partially completed sentences to scaffold note-taking:

1. My boyfriend planted ________.

2. Well, when I’m sitting there, usually I ________and people think I’m______.

3. My brother ____________

4. I tell my ______________ and it never ____________.

5. Kevin ________

6. _______ is getting _________ and then having the hard work ethic to _________.

7. Watching _____________

8. “I had some _______, they were ________ in my _______.”

9. __________  cause of those________.

10. _____________ down the street and I’ll see_____________ with my shirt on from my tour. And I’ll just stop my car and ________.

b) In pairs, reconstruct the original questions based on  your notes. Compare your answers.

c) *Optional: In pairs brainstorm 5 questions you’d like to ask your favorite celebrity to get to know them better.

3. Speaking (15 minutes):

Congrats, you’ve scored a dinner with a celeb! Pick 5 questions to ask your AI star and chat for 10 minutes. Then, share the juicy details with the other fans!

4. Follow-up (5 minutes):

Now that you've met your celeb, spill the details! Team up and chat about your questions and their answers — who had the coolest conversation?

*Optional (if students need extra scaffolding): Reported Speech revision (on the screen)

E.g.: Taylor Swift said her boyfriend had planted an olive tree in her yard for Christmas and that was her best gift. I asked whether she has any nicknames and she replied that her brother calls her Taffy.

5. Reflection and feedback (2 min).

6. Homework (optional):

Ask pairs of students to post their findings on Padlet in the format of a celebrity gossip piece.