Breaking News English

Monday November 8, 2004
Pre-Intermediate +

Britain’s marathon runner Paula Radcliffe has put the agony of her Athens Olympics failures behind her by winning the 35^th New York Marathon. She has bounced back from heartbreak just three months after her nightmare in the women’s marathon, and pulling out half way through the 10,000 metres. This is her first race since her Olympic disappointment, and she decided only recently to run. She was in the lead for the whole race as her rivals slowly dropped off the pace.

World record holder Radcliffe started the race as joint favorite, despite her loss of form in Athens. In a very exciting race she was neck-and-neck with Kenyan Susan Chepkemei until the final meters, before pulling away to win by four seconds, in a time of 2:23:10. It was the closest finish in the history of the NY Marathon and erased memories of the Olympics for the 30-year-old Briton. She said, "It's a good way to end the year … I'm ready for a good rest now."

WARM UPS / COOL DOWNS

1. CHAT:  Talk about jogging / running / marathons / half-marathons ...

2. I RUN:  Have students tell each other the times they have had to run today / yesterday / at the weekend / last week. And the reasons why.

3. OLYMPICS:  Students tell each other their Olympic memories.

4. MEN vs. WOMEN:  Students face each other in rows. Row A students are for women sports, row B for men. Change partners every one or two minutes (when noise dies down). Which sports are best (most entertaining) played by men, and which by women? – tennis, golf, judo, soccer, boxing, volleyball, gymnastics, bull-fighting, skiing…

5. FAVE FEMALES:  Students tell each other their favorite female athletes.

PRE-READING IDEAS

1. PREDICTION: Here are some words from the article. With your partner / group talk about what you expect to read.:
 agony     bounce back     nightmare     in the lead     joint favorite     neck-and-neck     close finish     good rest

2. WORD MATCH:  Match the following word pairs from the article:

	The agony	rest
	marathon	favorite
	joint	out of
	pull	of
	a good	runner
	close	lead
	in the	neck
	erase	memories of
	neck-and-	finish

3. NATIONALITY etc:  Underline the correct adjective for the person:

	Place	Person adjective
	America	an American   an Americonian     an Americish
	Britain	a Britainer     a Briton     a Britishian
	Kenya	a Kenyaman     a Kenyan     a Kenyanian
	New York	a New Yokonian     a Newie     a New Yorker
	London	a Londoner     a Londonite     a London
	Iraq	an Iraqan     an Iraqer     an Iraqi
	Your students place
	Your students place

Have fun by practicing the pronunciation patterns of even the incorrect adjectives (they still fit the patterns of similarly constructed words).

4. SEXIST?:  The headline says ‘women’s marathon’. If it was about a male race, the headline probably would not say ‘men’s marathon’. Is this sexist?.

WHILE READING ACTIVITIES

1. PREDICTION / WORD MATCH:  Check your answers to the above activities.

2. NUMBERS:  Students have to find what the following numbers refer to:

35     three     10,000     four     2:23:10     30
Introduce the language “X is the number of /age / distance / time / winning margin …”

3. I’M IMPRESSED:  As you read circle anything you are impressed by.

4. VOCABULARY:  Students circle any words they do not understand. In groups pool unknown words and use dictionaries to find the meanings.

5. QUESTIONS:  Make notes for questions (opinions or factual) you want to ask the class about the information in the article.

POST READING IDEAS

1. PREPOSITIONS: Without looking at the text put these prepositions in the correct place:

	the agony	out of a race
	pull	for a good rest
	win	of losing
	ready	by 4 seconds
	bounce back	of two hours and twenty-three minutes
	a time	from a bad experience

2. I’M IMPRESSED:  Pairs of students talk about the things they were impressed by. Introduce the prompts “ I was impressed by / with her …”. “I was impressed by the fact that …” …

3. VOCABULARY: As a class, go over the vocabulary students circled above.

4. QUESTIONS: Students ask the class the questions they made about the information in the article.

5. MY RECORDS: In pairs/groups students create a questionnaire for a class survey on records in their lives (i.e. the record number of hamburgers eaten at once, their record for getting out of the house in the morning, their record length of time in bed…). Once complete, students find the information from other students and report their findings back to their original partner.

6. NEVER GIVE UP: Students make notes for a mini-speech on one occasion in their life they never gave up. Tell their partner / group about this in more narrative style. Partner / group members have to ask questions. Change partners / groups and share the stories you heard with others.

7. MY SPORT: Students make notes on (exaggerate?) their finest sporting moment. Tell their partner / group about this in more narrative style. Partner / group members have to ask questions. Change partners / groups and share the stories you heard with others.

8. AGONY, HEARTBREAK …: Students make notes on their experience of agony, heartbreak, disappointment, pulling out; and bouncing back, pulling away, erasing memories. Tell their partner / group about this in more narrative style. Partner / group members have to ask questions. Change partners / groups and share the stories you heard with others.

9. I’M READY: Write the prompt “I’m ready for (to)…” on the board. Students write 3 ideas to finish each sentence, related to their lives. Compare sentences with rest of class and talk about why they are ready. Repeat with the prompt “I’m not ready for (to)…”.

 
 

HOMEWORK

1. VOCAB EXTENSION: Choose several of the words from the text. Use a dictionary or the Google search field to build up more associations / collocations of each word.

2. WEB LINK: For info on women in sport, visit http://www.womenssportsfoundation.org

3. ARTICLE: Write a short report on women in sport in your country.

4. REPORTER: Write a newspaper article about a (sporting) success of yours.

ANSWERS

NATIONALITY etc
American
Briton
Kenyan
New Yorker
Londoner
Iraqi