Task Journal 20.

3. LESSON PLANNING: CREATING EMPHASIS

A. Prepare a Study Practice activity to teach two different cases of inversion for a class of your choice . See worksheet
that follows. It is intended for a LINC 6/7 class of about 15 students. It covers inversion with
negative adverbials and inversion with time relationships.

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Task Journal 20.0

In each of the following sentences, an adverbial has been fronted, but the writer forgot to invert. Find
the error and write the sentence correctly. In some cases, you may need to add a word.

1. Little she did know that they were planning a surprise party.

2. On no account you may use my computer.

3. Never I have seen such a mess!

4. Only then they will understand what I mean.

5. No sooner we had come home than the phone rang.

6. Not until summer we will have a holiday.

7. Only after much practice we begin to master a second language.

8. Here the sun comes!

9. Seldom I have seen her drunk.

10. Down the rain came.

Imagine that you trusted your teenager with your car for the first time and s/he has come home
several hours past curfew smelling like a party. You are very angry and want to emphasize the
seriousness of the offense. Use your own words to finish these sentences. The first one has been done
as an example.

1. Never before have you so deeply disappointed me and your father .

2. Not only .
3. Rarely .
4. Under no circumstances .
5. Only when .
6. Not until .
7. At no time .

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Task Journal 20.0

B. Prepare an Activate activity to practice emphasis in speaking for a class of your choice.
By this point students in the LINC 6/7 class have been guided through a number of SP activities, including taking
up the one above (parent upset with a disobedient teen).

In that vein, T explains that Ss are to get in groups of 3 to execute similar role plays. For random assignment of
skit themes, T goes around the room allowing one person from each team to select a card from the hat. T
explains that they have 20 minutes to write and plan their skits and will be allowed to use empty rooms in the
school (the board room, the empty classroom of the class that is in the computer lab today, etc.) for an
additional 10 minutes for a bit of rehearsal. Then students are to return to the class to perform their skits for the
class. They may use minimal cheat sheets to help them remember their lines, but not fully written out
sentences. Students are encouraged to use sentence patterns and phrases from their SP worksheets and SF
reference charts, which include fronting and inversion with negative adverbials and with time relationships. T
stresses to students not to try to cram as much fronting into the skit as possible--that it’s more important to use
fronting for emphasis appropriately. Quality over quantity this time!

A is a spouse who has come home early from
work to find partner (B) in bed with best friend
(C). How does A emphasize how shocked and
disappointed s/he is in B? In C? What do B and C
each have to say for themselves?
A is a boss who comes in early to work to find
worker B kissing worker C while hiding in A’s
office. How does their conversation unfold?
Remember that A is very upset and shocked.
S/he has NEVER witnessed such behavior and
hopes never to see it again.

A is a customer in a hair salon. When B finishes A is a customer of a well-known

cutting A’s hair, A looks in the mirror to find that
A has butchered the job. A is extremely upset
and makes many threats. C is the manager who
intervenes.
telecommunications company calling to complain
about yet another problem with her/his cell
phone. A has been getting the runaround. If
customer service clerk B cannot satisfy A,
supervisor C will come on the phone and try to
make A happy.

A and B are dining out in a nice restaurant. C is
the wait staff who can’t do anything right. First C
spills wine on B. Then C brings out the wrong
food. You can add a few more gaffes. Finally A
can’t take any more incompetence and blows up
at C. What does A say? What does B say? What
about poor C?
A and B are riding in a taxi to the airport in a
large city with which they are not familiar. In
spite of telling the driver, C, that they are on a
tight schedule, the driver takes them the long
way. A looks repeatedly at a wrist watch and gets
more and more upset with the driver. When C
has a fender-bender, causing A and B to surely
miss their flight, everyone loses their temper.

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In spite of T’s admonition, Ss are bound to have some instances of using fronting in unnatural ways.
This will give the class juicy opportunity to explore when fronting for emphasis sounds natural and
when it doesn’t.

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