Prof. Pietro Gentile

Fabiola Masi

Topic

Journalism

Title

HOW TO BECOME A JOURNALIST

Addresses and Level

V° class of high school     Level B1

Teaching Units

·        Unit 1  Let’s read a newspaper!

·        Unit 2  What’s a layout?

·        Unit 3  The 5 WH of a good journalist

·        Unit 4  An interview, please!

·        Unit 5  Let’s write an article!

Prerequisites

Can communicate with accuracy in familiar context, knowledge of general grammar rules, can produce clearly intelligible continuous writing, has a sufficient vocabulary to express him/herself with some circumlocutions on most topics pertinent to everyday life, can check information, ability to skim and scan written texts.

Aims

General formative aim: make students aware of the world of information, promote creativity and the ability to work in team.

General linguistic aim: improve interaction, improve vocabulary and being able to write reports and to express opinions following a formal layout.

Objectives

Grammar: to reinforce grammar, to learn how to report, learn an appropriate standard phraseology, to improve grammatical accuracy of written forms.

Vocabulary: to learn new terminology, to improve familiar vocabulary, to understand some word-play and metaphor in articles

Communicative: can take initiatives in an interview, can write articles, notes and convey information and ideas, can summarize and give opinions about factual information.

Can do statements

At the end of this module students have to achieve the following can do statements:

·        Write an article

·        Make an oral interview and a written report

·        Use a formal layout

Competences involved

General competences: declarative knowledge - skills and know-how - existential competence - ability to learn

Communicative language competences:

Linguistic competences: sufficient range of language to describe unpredictable situations, explain the main points in an idea and express thoughts on abstract and cultural topics such as in magazines and newspapers, sufficient vocabulary to express him/herself with some circumlocutions on most topics pertinent to everyday life. Communicate with accuracy in familiar context, knowledge of general grammar rules, good control through with noticeable mother tongue influence.

Pragmatic competences: can express him/herself with relative ease, despite some problems with formulation resulting in pauses, can adapt the expression to deal with less routine, can link a series of elements into a linear sequence of points and explain the main points with in an idea with reasonable precision.

Functions

·        Talking about news and events

·        Selecting information in a written text

·        Report and discuss about events

·        Take turn in a discourse

·        Make an oral and written report

·        Giving information

·        Make an interview.

Strategies

Reception: can identify unfamiliar words from the context and deduce the sentence meaning if the topic of the article is familiar.

Production: can rehearse and try out new combinations and expressions, can define the features of something concrete for which he/she can’t remember the word.

Interaction: can intervene in a discussion and take his/her turn using familiar vocabulary or the new studied phraseology, can summarise and ask someone to clarify what they have just said.

Tasks to be performed

·        Skim and scan articles

·        Working in groups for interviews

·        to report information

·        to summarise the main points of an article

·        give titles and subtitles to articles

·        to follow a precise layout

·        to write an essay expressing personal opinions

Texts to be used

Articles about different topics with different layouts, questionnaires, interviews (written), statistics, instruction on how to write an article taken from a text book.

Assessment

·        to follow a guided layout reporting given information (guided production)

·        to write an article selecting information (half structured production)

·        make an interview (role play as oral test)

Criteria of Assessment

Written test criteria:  Assessment grid

Linguistic accuracy: form 0 to 3 points (maximum 10)

Layout: from 0 to 2 points

Written fluency: from 0 to 2 points

Content: from 0 to 3 points     

Oral test criteria: Assessment grid

Interactive communication: from 0 to 3 points (maximum 10)

Accuracy: from 0 to 3 points

Fluency: from 0 to 2 points

Content: from 0 to 2 points

Aids

Magazines, newspapers, OHP, Internet, Textbook

Time

15 h