Thursday December 16, 2004

Pre-Intermediate +

THE ARTICLE

All change at the British Foreign Office. The United Kingdom has announced major changes in the structure of its overseas embassies and consulates in a cost-cutting measure to help fight nuclear weapon proliferation, terrorism, and climate change. Nine embassies will be closed while many others will be streamlined. Those to get the chop are from what Britain regards as insignificant countries, mainly in the South Pacific and Africa. Those to be streamlined, which involve job losses and consulate closures, are mainly in America and Europe. It is hoped more than $100 million will be saved.

An opposition spokesman criticized the move for having a negative impact on British interests around the world, saying the government “must show that British commercial interests and the interests of Britons abroad will not be adversely affected” by the changes. Others have accused the government of trying to find cash to fund Britain’s presidency of the G8 and European Union next year (2005). Embassies will close in the Bahamas, East Timor, Kiribati, Lesotho, Madagascar, Paraguay, Swaziland, Tonga, and Vanuatu. In the past three years, however, more important embassies in Afghanistan, Libya, North Korea and Iraq have been opened.

POSSIBLE WARM UPS / COOL DOWNS

1. CHAT:  Talk in pairs or groups about embassies and consulates / visas / UK government / diplomatic representation / Kiribati and Vanuatu / saving money …
To make things more dynamic, try telling your students they only have one minute (or 2) on each chat topic before changing topics / partners. Change topic / partner frequently to energize the class.

2. SURPLUS TO OUR NEEDS: Write the list of countries in which Britain is to close embassies on the board. Students discuss the importance of these countries to their own:

3. DIPLOMATIC CHOICES: Write a list of 10 countries on the board – big or small, powerful and weak, pariah or neutral, enemy or friend... Students have $100,000,000 to spend on those embassies. They discuss how much to apportion each and justify their diplomatic budgets.

4. MY EMBASSY: Students talk to each other about their embassy – experience and dealings, reputation and image, offered services and expectations, etc etc etc.

5. CONSULAR SERVICES: Students rank how important each of these consular services are:
- travel advisories
- providing visas for visitors
- gaining overseas trade contracts
- showing the world your culture
- spying
- providing marriage licenses and birth certificates for ex patriots living overseas
- providing emergency assistance to nationals abroad
- repatriating dead bodies
- providing help with international kidnappings
- holding cultural parties and festivals
- providing an overseas place to vote in national elections
- Others?

6. 2-MINUTE DEBATES: Students face each other in pairs and engage in the following (for-fun) 2-minute debates. Students A are assigned the first argument, students B the second. Rotate pairs to ensure a lively pace and noise level is kept:
The nine countries are not important. vs. How can you say that.
Fighting terrorism and global warming is more important than having embassies in Tonga and Vanuatu. vs Not for British citizens and business people who live on Tonga and Vanuatu.
Britain should have embassies in every country of the world. vs When there are telephones and the Internet you don’t need embassies everywhere.
Embassies don’t really help travelers or students. vs. Embassies provide an invaluable service.
A diplomatic career is very exciting. vs. A diplomatic career is living in a boring country, not speaking the language and missing your own food.
Swaziland is more important than Afghanistan. vs. How ridiculous.

PRE-READING IDEAS

1. WORD SEARCH: Students look in their dictionaries / computer to find collocates, other meanings, information, synonyms … of the words ‘embassy’, and ‘diplomatic’.

2. TRUE / FALSE: Students look at the headline and predict whether they believe the following statements are true or false:
(a)  Britain will close all of its worldwide embassies.  T / F
(b)  Embassies are being closed to help fight nuclear weapon proliferation, terrorism, and climate change. T / F
(c)  Nine embassies will be closed.  T / F
(d)  No job losses will be involved.  T / F
(e)  Consulates will close across the USA and Europe.  T / F< br> (f)  An opposition spokesman said the move should have a positive impact on British interests around the world T /
(g)  The UK government needs cash to fund Britain’s presidency of the G8 and European Union next year T / F
(h) In the past three years important embassies in Afghanistan, Libya, North Korea and Iraq have been opened.  T / F

3. SYNONYM MATCH: Students match the following synonyms from the article:

(a)	announced	negatively
(b)	major	restructured
(c)	overseas	axe
(d)	cost-cutting	finance
(e)	streamlined	dramatic
(f)	chop	declared
(g)	criticized	measure
(h)	move	abroad
(i)	adversely	confronted
(j)	fund	penny-pinching

4. PHRASE MATCH: Students match the following phrases based on the article (sometimes more than one combination is possible):

(a)	all	measure
(b)	major	chop
(c)	cost-cutting	affected
(d)	nuclear weapon	change
(e)	get the	changes
(f)	have a negative	important
(g)	commercial	to fund
(h)	adversely	impact on
(i)	find cash	proliferation
(j)	more	interests

 

WHILE READING ACTIVITIES

1. GAP-FILL:  Put the missing words under each paragraph into the gaps.

UK closes embassies

All change at the British Foreign Office. The United Kingdom has announced __________ changes in the structure of its overseas embassies and consulates in a cost-cutting __________ to help fight nuclear weapon proliferation, terrorism, and climate change. Nine embassies will be closed while many others will be __________. Those to get the chop are from what Britain regards as insignificant countries, mainly in the South Pacific and Africa. Those to be streamlined, which involve job __________ and consulate closures, are mainly in America and Europe. It is __________ more than $100 million will be saved.		streamlined measure hoped major losses
An opposition __________ criticized the move for having a negative impact on British __________ around the world, saying the government “must show that British commercial interests and the interests of Britons __________ will not be adversely affected” by the changes. Others have __________ the government of trying to find cash to __________ Britain’s presidency of the G8 and European Union next year (2005). Embassies will close in the Bahamas, East Timor, Kiribati, Lesotho, Madagascar, Paraguay, Swaziland, Tonga, and Vanuatu. In the past three years, however, more important embassies in Afghanistan, Libya, North Korea and Iraq have been opened.		abroad interests spokesman fund accused

 

3. TRUE/FALSE:  Students check their answers to the T/F exercise.

4. PHRASE MATCH: Students check their answers to the phrase match exercise.

5. QUESTIONS: Students make notes for questions they would like to ask the class about the article.

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

POST READING IDEAS

1. GAP-FILL: Check the answers to the gap-fill exercise.

2. QUESTIONS:  Students ask the discussion questions they thought of above to their partner / group / class. Pool the questions for all students to share.

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

4. STUDENT-GENERATED SURVEY: Pairs/Groups write down 3 questions based on the article. Conduct their surveys alone. Report back to partners to compare answers. Report to other groups / the whole class.

5. ‘EMBASSY/ DIPLOMATIC’: Students make questions based on their findings from pre-reading activity #1.

6. DIPLOMATIC DISCUSSION: Students ask each other the following questions:

(a)  Would you like to be a diplomat?
(b)  Are you diplomatic?
(c)  Could you live in a distant country for many years?
(d)  What dealings have you had with your own embassies and consulates?
(e)  Does your country have a good international reputation?
(f)  Is it important to have diplomatic representation in every country in the world?
(g)  If you were a diplomat, in which country would you like to work?
(h)  Is it wrong for Britain to close the nine embassies?
(i)  Is fighting international terrorism more important than diplomatic relations with small countries?
(j)  How do you think the people of Swaziland, Tonga etc feel about the embassy closures?

7. WARMERS:  Students redo one of the warmers more comprehensively.

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. INTERNET: Search the Internet and find more information on your country's embassy. Share your findings with your class next lesson.

3. MY EMBASSY: Create an information poster of the consular services offered by your government.

4. LETTER TO BRITAIN: You are a resident of Swaziland. Write a letter to the British Government protesting against the closure of the British Embassy.

ANSWERS

TRUE / FALSE:

(a)  Britain will close all of its worldwide embassies.  F
(b)  Embassies are being closed to help fight nuclear weapon proliferation, terrorism, and climate change. T
(c)  Nine embassies will be closed.  T
(d)  No job losses will be involved.  F
(e)  Consulates will close across the USA and Europe.  T
(f)  An opposition spokesman said the move should have a positive impact on British interests around the world F
(g)  The UK government needs cash to fund Britain’s presidency of the G 8 and European Union next year F
(h) In the past three years important embassies in Afghanistan, Libya, North Korea and Iraq have been opened.  T

SYNONYM MATCH:

(a)	announced	declared
(b)	major	dramatic
(c)	overseas	abroad
(d)	cost-cutting	penny-pinching
(e)	streamlined	restructured
(f)	chop	axe
(g)	criticized	confronted
(h)	move	measure
(i)	adversely	negatively
(j)	fund	finance

PHRASE MATCH:

(a)	all	change
(b)	major	changes
(c)	cost-cutting	measure
(d)	nuclear weapon	proliferation
(e)	get the	chop
(f)	have a negative	impact on
(g)	commercial	interests
(h)	adversely	affected
(i)	find cash	to fund
(j)	more	important