Belén Aquino

Methodology
Practice lessons
School: E.N.S.L.V. “Pte. Roque Sáenz Peña”

Course: 1st 5th

Teacher: María Alejandra Robin da Costa

Trainee: Belén Aquino

1) Topic: ghost towns

What is a ghost town?
What happened to these towns?
Why did people leave? Is there only one reason to leave a
town? What do they look like now? Are they inhabited?

2) Final task:

Students will create a travel blog - on paper if there are no internet resources - in which
they’ll describe ghost towns to travellers. This will be done in small groups, no more
than 4 students per group.

Each group will be randomly assigned a ghost town we haven’t worked with throughout
the project. They will write a short description of the town and select one or two
pictures to illustrate. Below the description, comments from travellers should appear
telling their experience in each town and suggesting activities for those who would like
to go.

3) Objectives:
❏ to express finished actions
❏ to refer about a sequence of actions in the past
❏ to emphasize an action in progress in the past
❏ to show that two actions happened simultaneously in the past
❏ to make use of vocabulary related to towns and cities
❏ to produce a brief description of a place
❏ to make use of descriptive adjectives
❏ to reflect on what drives people to be kind
❏ to design a travel blog
❏ to value people’s actions towards oneself
Belén Aquino
 Methodology
Practice lessons

4) Contents:
● Thematic content: ghost towns
● Linguistic content:
- Grammar
Function Form Exponent

Expressing Simple - Belén started working when she was 18.

finished actions Past - Robin and Belén met two weeks ago.
- I went to bed late last night, so I’m tired now.
- My students and I decided to move the exam for next
week. - Belén didn’t know how many students there were in
1st 5th. - The movie didn’t end well, I didn’t like it.

Narrating a - Last night, I got home, cooked dinner, then I did some
past reading for university, and went to bed at around 11pm. - I
sequence of didn’t finish my homework because I didn’t have the book, I
actions left it at my grandma’s house and she didn’t bring it when
she came home.

Emphasizing Past - I was working late last night, that’s why I wasn’t home. -
an action in continuous Belén and her friend were studying all week before their
progress in exam.
the past - My students weren’t doing a test, they were completing
an assignment.
- The dog wasn’t eating food, he was eating a shoe!

Showing that - Alejandra was taking notes while Belén was teaching
two actions the lesson.
happened - The students were completing an activity as their
simultaneou teacher was preparing the following one.
sly in the - My teacher wasn’t explaining while I was writing, she
past was making a comment on the task.

- Lexis

Vocabulary related to towns and cities: - buildings -

- a university, a church, a market, a

prison, a hospital, a theatre, a school, a
Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
casino, a sports centre, a railway
 station, a building

Descriptive adjectives - people & places -

- peaceful, long, tiring, beautiful, huge,

ruined, chilly, famous, friendly, popular,
expensive, cheap, bright, busy, sunny,
dark, fantastic, crowded, clean, unsafe,
safe, modern, quiet
● Strategic content: how to write a blog entry
● Intercultural content: ghost towns around the world; how they
became ghost towns

5) Evaluation: students will be evaluated throughout the lessons on their

participation and the hand-in productions asked of them. Their final
task
will also be a way of assessment.
1st class - Monday 6/5 - 70 minutes

Time Activity Dynamics Resour

allotted ce s

20’ ICE-BREAKER whole cardboa

class rd
Students will listen to me giving a brief introduction hands
about myself. They will be told why I’ll be working with
them and what the final task will be.

We’ll play a game to get to know each other a little: never

have I ever

Each student will receive 5 cards saying I have. In a

circle, each will say something they have never done.
The student that has done it, loses a card. The goal is to
be the last one remaining.

I will start by saying “never have I ever studied for an exam

Belén Aquino
Methodology
 Practice lessons
the previous evening” so as to set an example. I will also be
the last one and I’ll say “never have I ever been to a ghost
town” -> the concept will probably need a bit of explanation
at the time, but something basic will be said so as they
easily grasp the idea and are able to answer.

20’ TASK whole flashcar

class ds of
Students will be shown cards of ghost towns around the ghost
world with their name on it. They will have to try and guess towns +
where each town is (point to each place in the map) and world
what happened to them. map

25’ TASK individ Reading

ual + activity
I will give the students a text about a ghost town. group https://
Each student receives 1 out of 6 ghost towns. work do
cs.googl
Students will read on their own about the towns shown e.
before bearing in mind the question “why did it become a com/do
ghost town?” cu
ment/d/
Once they’re done, they will look around the classroom 1
for other students that got the same town as them. R44pjSo
They will discuss the singpost question. e
UU0TstD
Each group will receive some sugar paper with the picture 6i
of the town they got and they will write their answer on it. rOV166d
M
They will share and hang their work on the KE869Gz
U
walls. report - whole class - 5’ YMVk0AY
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+
flashcar
ds &
sugar
paper
for
answer
s

10’ TASK Individual book

Students will read the short texts from pages 16 & 17 in

their books, and then we’ll discuss the questions
provided in exercise 3.
5’ ROUND-OFF whole
class
I will ask the students if they have ever been to a ghost
town or if they know about one. If nobody were to be able
to provide an answer, I will tell them about a ghost town
I’ve been to.

Can you find any other? If you feel like it, maybe you
could google it and show us tomorrow.

Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
2nd class - Tuesday 6/5 - 80 minutes

10’ PRE-TASK whole

class
I’ll ask the students what was discussed the previous class.
We’ll go back to the idea of ghost towns being deserted
places because of many different reasons: war, bombing,
floods, volcano eruptions, etc.

10’ TASK whole flashcar

class ds of
I’ll show pictures of different places that make up a town: places
shops. leisure centers, town park, etc. We’ll discuss what in town
they are and the students will say whether or not they
think these towns had them.

10’ TASK individual taskshe

et n°1
Students will complete Tasksheet n°1: places crossword. https://
Once they’re done, they will check their answers with a do
classmate - pairwork - and then whole class discussion. cs.googl
e.
com/doc
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ment/d/
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15’ TASK Individual Blank

sheets
Students will choose one of the places described and of
will make a sketch of it thinking about what it looks paper
like in a deserted ghost town. for
each
student

3rd lesson - Wednesday 8/5 - 80 minutes

25’ TASK individual sugar

paper to
Different descriptive adjectives will be written on the paste
board. We’ll discuss them orally. Students will write a their work
brief description of the sketch they made using some of
the adjectives explained before.

ON THE BOARD

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Methodology
Practice lessons
Describing places

quiet
calm
dangerous
safe
messy
tidy
crowded
desolate
narrow
wide
boring
entertaining
old
modern
25’ TASK whole flashcar
class ds of
Students will sit in a circle. I will show them flashcards events
with different well-known events that have taken place
over the past 3-4 years: the Manchester bombing at
Ariana Grande’s concert, the burning of the Notre-Dame
Cathedral a few
weeks ago, and so on.
They will be asked “Where were you when this
event happened?” and “What were you doing?”

I will start so as to provide an example. The answers will

be written on the board.

ON THE BOARD

I was at work when the Cathedral got burnt.

i was talking to some students when a colleague
mentioned the fire.

20’ LG FOCUS group

work
Students will read all of the answers written on the board
by themselves. They will be asked to try and come up with
similarities among them; they will do this in small
groups.

Students will give their conclusions out loud and I will take

Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
 notes of what they say.

ON THE BOARD

I was at work when the Cathedral got burnt.

i was talking to some students when a colleague
mentioned the fire.

I was…
I was doing….

I will ask:
- When do these events take place? Past, present, or
future?
- What’s the difference between I was in the
supermarket and I was buying groceries?

The idea is to make a point of the difference between

the Simple Past and the Past Continuous.

4th lesson - Monday 13/5 - 80 minutes

15’ PRE-TASK

Show the students the poster with their answers from the
previous lesson. Elicit from the students the TENSE they
used and the conclusions they reached after discussing
with their classmates the similarities/differences among
the sentences.

15’ LG FOCUS individual book +

list of
Students will work on the texts from pages 16-17 on their verbs
book. They will underline the verbs in simple past and look
for the infinitive form of each one in their list.

ON THE BOARD

Base form Simple Past

be was

Belén Aquino
 Methodology
Practice lessons
do did

have had

grow grew

lose lost

make made

leave left

go went

be were

die died

live lived

move in moved in

call called

not do didn’t do

find found

want wanted

start started

report - whole class - 3’

35’ LANGUAGE FOCUS pair work Taskshe

et n°2
Students will be given Tasksheet n°2, in which they will try https://
to deduce the FORM of SIMPLE PAST, based on the texts do
from the book, the comparison between base form + cs.googl
simple past from the list of verbs they underlined in the e.
texts, and their answers from the first activity. com/do
cu
ment/d/
1
What do we use it
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Structure Examples
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for?
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 1
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n
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7w/edit

Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
The teacher told
Auxiliary verb:
the students
to talk about
about a time she
actions that
was in a ghost
town. Did you find
……………………
the anecdote
Verbs:
interesting?

to tell a
The students read
the text, but they
…………………… of
didn’t
understand it, so
actions in the
their teacher
……………………
helped them get
it.
(as in a
………………, for
example)

Report - whole class - 10’

5th lesson - Tuesday 14/5 - 80 minutes

20’ PRE-TASK

Casual chat: tell the students one or two things about

what I did over the weekend. Then, ask students about
theirs. Each of them gets to say one thing he/she did.

10’ TASK group cards

work with
On a table, the answers the students provided to the student
where were you? activity will be displayed written on s’
cardboard. Sugar paper will be displayed with two answers
columns on it: simple past & past continuous. Students + sugar
have to place each sentence in the correct column. paper

25’ LANGUAGE FOCUS group https://

work do
Students will have to come up with the rules of the cs.googl
past continuous by looking at their examples. e.
com/do
We will share and define which are the uses and structure cu
of this tense. ment/d/
1
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Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
What do 7w/edit
Structure Examples
we use
it for?

Prefect (entering the

Auxiliary verb:
classroom): Hi! Is
to talk
everything OK here?
about
Belén: Yes! I was
an
telling the students
about a time I went to
Verbs:
action in
a ghost town. I wasn’t
…………
talking too loud, was
I?
…………
in the
past

The students were

to show
working on the book
that
while Belén was
preparing the
…………
materials for the
actions
following activity.
were
happeni
ng at the
…………
….. time
in the
past
20’ LANGUAGE FOCUS individual Taskshe
et nº3
Students will work on Tasksheet nº3 individually, then
check in pairs, and then we’ll do whole class correction.

15’ ROUND-OFF individual binders

Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
Students will provide orally an example using either the
simple past or the past continuous. I will start so as to give
them an example. The other day I was at the supermarket
and a lady was shouting really loud, it was scary.

6th class - Wednesday 15/5 - 80 minutes

10’ PRE-TASK

Activity 2, p.11 workbook. Students will work on the

vocabulary of places.

20’ TASK individual workbook

Students will work on activities 1 & 4, p.12 from

their workbook.

Report - 5’ each

5’ TASK whole https://

class w
Students will watch a video about the city of Villa Epecuén. ww.yout
The video shows pictures of the before and after of the city. u
They will have to identify 5 different places in the video of
the ones studied. be.com/
w
atch?v=
m
dSdGuHi
D Eo +
computer
15’ TASK individual

Students will have to write the story of Epecuén. They can

use the short texts we read about other ghost towns as a
model. They have to answer the questions:

What do you think Epecuén was like before?

What happened that it turned into a ghost
town? What is it like today?

15’ TASK whole Taskshe

class + et n°4
We will read about what actually happened in Epecuén. individual
Students will have to complete the text with missing
words.

10’ TASK individual Taskshe

et n°5
Students will go back to the texts about ghost towns and
they will complete tasksheet n°5.

Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
6th class - Wednesday 15/5 - 80 minutes - GAME DAY

10’ PRE-TASK whole pictures

class
Introduce the idea for the day: a series of games, played
in 3 teams. To establish the teams they will have to pick 1
out of 3 cards, the card they get sets the team they’re in.

20’ TASK group jeopardy

work game
Jeopardy! We will play this game in two groups.

The categories will be: places in a ghost town,

describing places, time & tense

Each group will choose the category and the level they want
to play for. The team with more points wins.

15’ TASK group taboo

work cards
Taboo!

Each group will choose a representative and they will

receive a card with some of the vocabulary we’ve been
 working with.

10’ TASK group text cut

work into
UNSCRAMBLE THE TEXT paragra
ph s
Each team will receive a text cut into paragraphs, they will
have to put it together and think of an appropriate title for
the text. The team that solves it first and comes up with the
most accurate title gets the points.

10’ TASK group alphabet

work cut-out
Vocabulary contest

Each group will receive letters and they will have to come
up with as many words as they can related to the topic
we’ve been working on. They get a point for each correctly
spelled word.

10’ TASK group 3

work cardboa
BLOW THE FISH rd fish

Each team will get a cardboard fish. They will be asked to do

Belén Aquino
Methodology
Practice lessons
different things, like getting the correct order on a
sentence, and if it’s correct they can blow the fish on the
floor. The one to get to the finish line first gets the points.

5’ ROUND-OFF whole
class
Remind the students about the assignment the following
day, ask for any queries and check they understand what
will be evaluated.

7th class - Thursday 16/5 - 40 minutes - TEST

35’ ASSESSMENT individual Taskshe

et n°6
Students will be given Tasksheet n°6. They will have
to complete it as if it were a test. They can’t use
their notes/material nor check in their books.
5’ ROUND-OFF whole
class
Wrap up the week by anticipating what will happen in
the following week.

8th lesson - Monday 20/5 - 80 minutes

15’ PRE-TASK

Retrieve what was done the previous week. Ask for

examples for the simple past and take a look at the places
flashcards used before.

45’ TASK group Envelop

work es with
MURDER MYSTERY in a ghost town - who killed this person clues
and why? for
every
Students will work in groups to solve clues and try to group +
guess who the murderer was and the motive behind the poster
kill. with
charact
er s &
descript
io n

10’ TASK individual

Students will put themselves in the shoes of the

detective. What questions would they have asked the
witness and the suspects?

TASK

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Methodology
Practice lessons
Students will

ROUND-OFF

9th lesson - Thursday 21/5 - 80 minutes

PRE-TASK
15’ TASK https://
w
Students will listen to a story about how a ghost town ww.yout
was rebuilt by the people. They will be given two u
questions to answer while listening: be.com/
w
Who is Ruben? What did he want to do? atch?v=
bv
Discussion: why did these people decide to rebuild a vxR1g1ii
place that wasn’t inhabited? what was their motive? A
what moved them? &t=319s
minute
4’ 50’’

15’ TASK whole

class
Think of a situation in which you were helped by someone
selflessly. When did that happen? How did this
person/group of people help you? Was it useful?

10th lesson - Wednesday 22/5 - 80 minutes