Christmas in Britain: Teacher’s notes
Ask the class if they have ever been on holiday to the UK (or America or Australia) at Christmas time. What was it like? (presents, lots of food and drink)
Task 1
Show film clip – do open quiz questions with the class
Question 1. Christmas pudding / you eat it after the main course, - Christmas dinner is traditionally eaten early afternoon about 2pm ( when the men got back from the pub!). Chrismas puddings used to contain silver sixpences ( a small coin about the size of a 5 cent piece. If you got a sixpence it was considered to be lucky. This custom has died out since people usually buy their puddings nowadays instead of making their own. A custom which is still upheld is covering the pudding in brandy and setting light to it!
Question 2
A Christmas Cracker - is a cardboard paper tube, wrapped in brightly coloured paper and twisted at both ends. There is a banger inside the cracker, two strips of chemically impregnated paper that react with friction so that when the cracker is pulled apart by two people, the cracker makes a bang.
– banger - paper hat in the shape of a crown – a joke – a small gift (trinket)
Question 3 A stocking. Hung at the end of bed or above an open fireplace in order for Father Christmas to deposit the children’s presents in on Christmas Eve.
Task 2
Get them to make as many words as possible from the words Happy Christmas.
Scoring can be done by getting people to read out their words and if others have them then the words are crossed out on everyone’s list and there are no points for these words. The remaining words on the student’s lists are then given the points listed on slide 7. Or, just get them to add up their own scores for all the words they have in both scenarios the one with the highest score is the winner.
Task 3:
Where in the World : This is a quiz for students to see how much they know about how Christmas is celebrated in other parts of the world. Start with the discussion questions then put students in teams or groups to do the quiz. Answers: 1 – e / 2 – c / 3 – h / 4 – b / 5 – f / 6 – d / 7 – a / 8 - g
Task 4 An unusual gift:
If you’ve ever received an unusual gift introduce this task by telling your students about it. Then put students into groups of five and ask them to read the different texts. Students then discuss the good points and bad points about each gift and order from the best to the worst. Use them as a discussion starter for talking about the giving and receiving of gifts. You could also use the Oxfam website to talk about giving charity gifts, which are also often unusual. See the link below to Oxfam Unwrapped.
Task 5:
Give a simple example of an acrostic poem on the board. They don’t have to be masterpieces, just short phrases or images relating to Christmas. If you have time, students could then design simple Christmas cards and write their poems on the inside.
Lesson duration is: 50 min
