Breaking News English

        

1. ORGAN TRADE: Walk around the class and talk to other students about the illegal organ trade. Change partners often. Share your findings with your first partner.

2. CHAT: In pairs / groups, decide which of these topics or words from the article are most interesting and which are most boring.

surgeon / on trial / guilty verdicts / gambling debts / profiting / scam / operation / online chat room / hospitalization / devices / getting caught / clamping down

Have a chat about the topics you liked. Change topics and partners frequently.

3. ILLEGAL: Complete this table about things traded illegally with your partner(s). Change partners and share what you wrote. Change and share again.

Trade in…	How serious is it?	How can we stop it?
organs
ivory
arms
drugs
animals
diamonds

4. SCAM: Students A strongly believe scams such as the illegal trade in human organs will stop one day; Students B strongly believe it will never stop.  Change partners again and talk about your conversations.

5. CLAMPED DOWN ON: Rank these and share your rankings with your partner. Put the things most in need of clamping down on at the top. Change partners often and share your rankings.

trade in human organs child labour corruption research into human cloning

banking incompetence alcoholism religious persecution the fur trade

6. TRIAL: Spend one minute writing down all of the different words you associate with the word 'trial'. Share your words with your partner(s) and talk about them. Together, put the words into different categories.

BEFORE READING / LISTENING

1. TRUE / FALSE: Read the headline. Guess if  a-h  below are true (T) or false (F).

a.	A doctor is accused of selling kidneys for iPads.	T / F
b.	A man set up a kidney-selling scam to help clear his gambling debts.	T / F
c.	A doctor received a little less than $8,000 to perform the operation.	T / F
d.	The operation was performed in the back room of a contractor's house.	T / F
e.	The teenager saw the cash-for-kidney offer in a local supermarket.	T / F
f.	The teenager suffered complications following the operation.	T / F
g.	His mother said he did not initially plan to buy an iPad.	T / F
h.	Chinese police are rounding up those involved in illegal organ trading.	T / F

2. SYNONYM MATCH: Match the following synonyms from the article.

1.	case	a.	trial
2.	hearing	b.	enticed
3.	charged with	c.	benefiting
4.	profiting	d.	beneficiary
5.	procedure	e.	legal dispute
6.	renal	f.	operation
7.	recipient	g.	frightened
8.	tempted	h.	accused of
9.	afraid	i.	preventing
10.	clamping down	j.	kidney

3. PHRASE MATCH:  (Sometimes more than one choice is possible.)

1.	eight other people are on	a.	gambling debts
2.	guilty	b.	hospitalization
3.	clear his	c.	for the procedure
4.	profiting from	d.	caught
5.	leased an operating theatre	e.	verdicts
6.	he suffered renal	f.	down on the illegal trade
7.	needing more	g.	trial
8.	tempted	h.	failure
9.	afraid of getting	i.	by the illegal organ traders
10.	clamping	j.	the scam

WHILE READING / LISTENING

GAP FILL: Put the words into the gaps in the text.

A surgeon and eight other people are on (1) ____________ in central China over the (2) ____________ of a teenager who sold a kidney to buy an iPad and iPhone. The two-day                      (3) ____________ ended on Friday and judges will decide on possible guilty verdicts and sentencing soon. Defendant He Wei is (4) ____________ with organising the illegal kidney trade in 2011. He hoped to clear his gambling (5) ____________ by profiting from the scam. Song Zhongyu, the surgeon, from a provincial hospital in Yunnan Province, was paid just over $8,000 to (6) ____________ the operation. Others accused include Tang Shimin, who leased an operating (7) ____________ for the procedure, and Su Kaizong, the contractor of the                      (8) ____________ department at a local hospital.		debts theatre case charged trial perform urology hearing
The 17-year-old teenager, (9) ____________ Wang, found the offer of $3,400 for a kidney on an online chat room. Soon after he left the hospital he suffered renal (10) ____________ and became ill, needing more hospitalization. His kidney was sold to its       (11) ____________ for around $35,000. Wang's mother told the court that her son did not sell his kidney to purchase the Apple (12) ____________: "My son was (13) ____________ by the illegal organ traders and was afraid of getting (14) ____________ with such a large amount of money, so he bought a cell phone and a tablet PC," she said. Chinese authorities have been clamping (15) ____________ on the illegal trade in human                   (16) ____________. Police arrested 137 people last month, including many doctors.		tempted failure organs down surnamed recipient caught devices

LISTENING – Listen and fill in the gaps

A surgeon and eight other people (1) ______________________ China over the case of a teenager who sold a kidney to buy an iPad and iPhone. The    (2) ______________________ on Friday and judges will decide on possible guilty (3) ______________________ soon. Defendant He Wei is charged with organising the illegal kidney trade in 2011. He hoped to clear his gambling debts (4) ______________________ scam. Song Zhongyu, the surgeon, from a provincial hospital in Yunnan Province, was paid just over $8,000 to perform the operation. (5) ______________________ Tang Shimin, who leased an operating theatre for the procedure, and Su Kaizong, the contractor of the (6) ______________________ a local hospital.

The 17-year-old teenager, surnamed Wang, found the offer of $3,400 for a kidney (7) ______________________ room. Soon after he left the hospital he (8) ______________________ and became ill, needing more hospitalization. His kidney was sold to (9) ______________________ $35,000. Wang's mother told the court that her son did not sell his kidney to purchase the Apple devices: "My son (10) ______________________ illegal organ traders and was afraid (11) ______________________ such a large amount of money, so he bought a cell phone and a tablet PC," she said. Chinese authorities have been (12) ______________________ illegal trade in human organs. Police arrested 137 people last month, including many doctors.

 
 

AFTER READING / LISTENING

1. WORD SEARCH: Look in your dictionary / computer to find collocates, other meanings, information, synonyms … for the words 'human' and 'organ'.

human

organ

• Share your findings with your partners.

• Make questions using the words you found.
• Ask your partner / group your questions.

2. ARTICLE QUESTIONS: Look back at the article and write down some questions you would like to ask the class about the text.

• Share your questions with other classmates / groups.
• Ask your partner / group your questions.

3. GAP FILL: In pairs / groups, compare your answers to this exercise. Check your answers. Talk about the words from the activity. Were they new, interesting, worth learning…?

4. VOCABULARY: Circle any words you do not understand. In groups, pool unknown words and use dictionaries to find their meanings.

5. TEST EACH OTHER: Look at the words below. With your partner, try to recall how they were used in the text:

case decide charged clear over local

offer ill mother tempted large 137

ORGAN TRADE SURVEY

Write five GOOD questions about organ trade in the table. Do this in pairs. Each student must write the questions on his / her own paper.

When you have finished, interview other students. Write down their answers.

	STUDENT 1 _____________	STUDENT 2 _____________	STUDENT 3 _____________
Q.1.
Q.2.
Q.3.
Q.4.
Q.5.

• Now return to your original partner and share and talk about what you found out. Change partners often.

• Make mini-presentations to other groups on your findings.

 
 

ORGAN TRADE DISCUSSION

STUDENT A's QUESTIONS (Do not show these to student B)

a)	What did you think when you read the headline?
b)	What springs to mind when you hear the word 'kidney'?
c)	What do you think about what you read?
d)	What sentence should the people get if found guilty?
e)	What do you think of the illegal trade in human organs?
f)	Who is worse, the guy who organised the trade of the doctor who performed the operation?
g)	Would you ever sell one of your organs?
h)	How big a problem do you think the trade in human organs is?
i)	Should the trade be legalized to ensure everything is fair and safe?
j)	Should the doctor have his medical license taken away?

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STUDENT B's QUESTIONS (Do not show these to student A)

a)	Did you like reading this article?
b)	Should governments do more to monitor online activity to halt the trade in human organs?
c)	Do you thing Mr Wang regrets his decision to trade his kidney?
d)	Should the gang compensate Mr Wang for his additional hospital costs?
e)	What do you think Wang's mother said to him when she found out?
f)	What can countries do to clamp down on and stamp out this trade?
g)	Should the recipients of illegally traded organs also be prosecuted?
h)	What does the illegal trade in human organs say about the world?
i)	Will the illegal trade in human organs ever stop?
j)	What questions would you like to ask the judge in this case?

LANGUAGE – MULTIPLE CHOICE

A surgeon and eight other people are (1) ____ trial in central China over the case of a teenager who sold a kidney to buy an iPad and iPhone. The two-day (2) ____ ended on Friday and judges will decide on possible guilty (3) ____ and sentencing soon. Defendant He Wei is charged (4) ____ organising the illegal kidney trade in 2011. He hoped to clear his gambling debts by profiting from the scam. Song Zhongyu, the surgeon, from a provincial hospital in Yunnan Province, was paid just over $8,000 to (5) ____ the operation. Others accused include Tang Shimin, who leased an operating (6) ____ for the procedure, and Su Kaizong, the contractor of the urology department at a local hospital.

The 17-year-old teenager, surnamed Wang, found the offer of $3,400 for a kidney on an online chat room. Soon after he left the hospital he suffered renal (7) ____ and became ill, (8) ____ more hospitalization. His kidney was sold to its (9) ____ for around $35,000. Wang's mother told the court that her son did not sell his kidney to purchase the Apple devices: "My son was tempted (10) ____ the illegal organ traders and was afraid of (11) ____ caught with such a large amount of money, so he bought a cell phone and a tablet PC," she said. Chinese authorities have been clamping (12) ____ on the illegal trade in human organs. Police arrested 137 people last month, including many doctors.

Put the correct words from the table below in the above article.

1.	(a)	of	(b)	in	(c)	at	(d)	on
2.	(a)	sounding	(b)	hearing	(c)	catching	(d)	listening
3.	(a)	verdicts	(b)	verandas	(c)	verges	(d)	verifies
4.	(a)	at	(b)	from	(c)	with	(d)	as
5.	(a)	function	(b)	appear	(c)	perform	(d)	work
6.	(a)	playhouse	(b)	theatre	(c)	auditorium	(d)	venue
7.	(a)	failure	(b)	stopped	(c)	defeat	(d)	loser
8.	(a)	needs	(b)	needed	(c)	needy	(d)	needing
9.	(a)	gradient	(b)	recipient	(c)	ingredient	(d)	lenient
10.	(a)	for	(b)	at	(c)	of	(d)	by
11.	(a)	gets	(b)	got	(c)	getting	(d)	get
12.	(a)	down	(b)	up	(c)	in	(d)	across

 
 

WRITING

Write about organ trade for 10 minutes. Correct your partner's paper.

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HOMEWORK

1. VOCABULARY EXTENSION: Choose several of the words from the text. Use a dictionary or Google's search field (or another search engine) to build up more associations / collocations of each word.

2. INTERNET: Search the Internet and find out more about the illegal organ trade. Share what you discover with your partner(s) in the next lesson.

3. ORGAN TRADE: Make a poster about the organ trade. Show your work to your classmates in the next lesson. Did you all have similar things?

4. TRIAL: Write a magazine article about the trial in China. Include imaginary interviews with the victim and defendants.

Read what you wrote to your classmates in the next lesson. Write down any new words and expressions you hear from your partner(s).

5. LETTER: Write a letter to a doctor. Ask him/her three questions about the illegal organ trade. Give him/her three of your opinions on it. Read your letter to your partner(s) in your next lesson. Your partner(s) will answer your questions.

 

 
 

ANSWERS

TRUE / FALSE:

a.

F

b.

T

c.

F

d.

F

e.

F

f.

T

g.

T

h.

T

SYNONYM MATCH:

1.	case	a.	legal dispute
2.	hearing	b.	trial
3.	charged with	c.	accused of
4.	profiting	d.	benefiting
5.	procedure	e.	operation
6.	renal	f.	kidney
7.	recipient	g.	beneficiary
8.	tempted	h.	enticed
9.	afraid	i.	frightened
10.	clamping down	j.	preventing

PHRASE MATCH:

1.	eight other people are on	a.	trial
2.	guilty	b.	verdicts
3.	clear his	c.	gambling debts
4.	profiting from	d.	the scam
5.	leased an operating theatre	e.	for the procedure
6.	he suffered renal	f.	failure
7.	needing more	g.	hospitalization
8.	tempted	h.	by the illegal organ traders
9.	afraid of getting	i.	caught
10.	clamping	j.	down on the illegal trade

GAP FILL:

Kidney for iPad trial opens in China

A surgeon and eight other people are on (1) trial in central China over the (2) case of a teenager who sold a kidney to buy an iPad and iPhone. The two-day (3) hearing ended on Friday and judges will decide on possible guilty verdicts and sentencing soon. Defendant He Wei is (4) charged with organising the illegal kidney trade in 2011. He hoped to clear his gambling (5) debts by profiting from the scam. Song Zhongyu, the surgeon, from a provincial hospital in Yunnan Province, was paid just over $8,000 to (6) perform the operation. Others accused include Tang Shimin, who leased an operating (7) theatre for the procedure, and Su Kaizong, the contractor of the (8) urology department at a local hospital.

The 17-year-old teenager, (9) surnamed Wang, found the offer of $3,400 for a kidney on an online chat room. Soon after he left the hospital he suffered renal (10) failure and became ill, needing more hospitalization. His kidney was sold to its (11) recipient for around $35,000. Wang's mother told the court that her son did not sell his kidney to purchase the Apple (12) devices: "My son was (13) tempted by the illegal organ traders and was afraid of getting (14) caught with such a large amount of money, so he bought a cell phone and a tablet PC," she said. Chinese authorities have been clamping (15) down on the illegal trade in human (16) organs. Police arrested 137 people last month, including many doctors.

LANGUAGE WORK

1 - d

2 - b

3 - a

4 - c

5 - c

6 - b

7 - a

8 - d

9 - b

10 - d

11 - c

12 - a

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