Food Marketing Strategies - CAE Lesson Plan on Advertising

Objectives: 

• To practice listening for gist and detail. 
• To practice CAE Paper 4 Task 3 (Multiple-choice listening)

Discuss in pairs:

To what extent do you feel advertising influences you?
You have heard of 'subliminal' advertising. Do you believe it still has an effect, or are contemporary audiences too aware of such methods nowadays?

Watch the video and tick the adjectives you feel relate to this presenter (as many as you wish):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKTORFmMycQ

appealing
sympathetic
informative
friendly
amusing
sarcastic
aggressive
smiley
apologetic
smug



"This is systematic cruelty. The only reason we get away with it is that there are people prepared to look the other way."

After hearing the punchline, has your opinion changed about what you ticked above? Discuss with a partner.

Now watch the video again and answer the embedded questions.
https://www.blubbr.tv/game/index.php?game_id=66114&org=0#.VRRewvmsW15

Discuss with your neighbour:

1) Does the presenter make you feel guilty?
2) To what extent might she be right that the general public is 'the secret weapon'?
3) If you could ask her a question, what would it be?
4) Can you describe your feelings in three words at the end of this presentation?
5) Related to what we have discussed in this unit, do you feel you are most influenced by words, smells, images or sounds?

What do these phrases mean?

The best thing since sliced bread
It's just chicken feed.
to look the other way
born out of necessity
the eye is drawn to
to pass something off as
the power of wilful ignorance cannot be overstated

Make these sentences true for yourself and compare with your neighbour:

.... is the best thing since sliced bread!
I would look the other way if ...
But I think it's wrong to look the other way when ...
When I look at advertisements, my eye is usually first drawn to ...
A problem in Russia which could be solved if it were not for wilful ignorance could be ...
I once saw ... being passed off as ...

Murder in Gorky Park - a mystery in the Past Simple

My 9-11 year olds have been learning the Past Simple and have become so expert in the past forms that we are now beginning to hear things like, "Did you went...?", "What did you ate...?", so I decided it was time to focus less on the verb form and more on the question form. This activity is based on six students but is adaptable for more, and requires a role card for each student and a table in which to collect their findings.

Lead-in: I asked, "What did you do at the weekend?" We had a brief discussion. Then I announced that there had been a murder at the weekend in Gorky Park. "Ooooh!" "And you were all in Gorky Park at the weekend, so the murderer is one of you!" (Lots of giggles)

Grammar Focus: I told the students that they were going to interview each other to find out who had been where at the time of the murder. Because I wanted to focus on the question forms, I had the students complete questions with the correct verb forms, eg. What time .... you ........ (arrive)? Just in case, we verbally drilled the answer form too.

Task: Each student had a role card with information about the time they arrived and left the park, the colour of their cap and shorts, what they took with them and where they were exactly in the park. Nowhere on the cards did it say who the murderer was. They asked each student the same questions and filled the information in to a table.

Conclusion: When all students had a completed table, I asked them to look at their information and compare it with the police's description of the murderers. To make it more interesting for the students, I had two murderers. I then read out that the murderer had been wearing a red cap and blue shorts, had been standing by the fountain etc. Following the facts they had collected, the students were able to work out who the murderers were.

As the students were mingling, they initially relied on the pre-prepared questions, but with time they started asking the questions freely (and correctly). The whole activity took about 25 minutes and provided a fun drill alternative. Since this class, the kids have repeatedly asked me if they could play 'The Murder Game' again. The task is adaptable for different grammar points and topics. We have since played: Who will win the lottery? (Future Simple) and Who is hiding the Leprechaun? (St. Patrik's Day)