Last week was a bad one for Sharon Stone. Addressing reporters at the Cannes film festival, she suggested that the recent earthquake that killed tens of thousands of people in Sichuan may have been the result of “bad karma” over China’s occupation of Tibet. Within 24 hours she had been dropped by Christian Dior from their Chinese advertisements.
Unfortunately for Sharon, many of the news reports, articles and blog postings that address this story remind us that footage of the interview may be seen on YouTube.
- Stone: China earthquake was bad for karma (The Guardian: May 28 2008)
- Dior drops Stone from Chinese marketing after ‘karma’ comment (The Guardian: May 29 2008)
- Bad karma bites Sharon Stone (The Guardian film blog: May 30 2008)
Some teachers might decide that this would be a good story to bring into the language classroom. It may appeal to certain learners and serve as a springboard for the discussion and exploration of issues that relate to it (celebrity endorsement, celebrity worship, celebrity stupidity, etc). Its ability to do so, however, could depend on whether or not learners are given access to the video footage that lies at its very heart. In an age in which the modern reader is assumed to have access to the full picture, it can pay to extend this climate to the language classroom whenever possible.
Lessons which combine words with pictures are more engaging than those which focus on words alone. For this reason it can be worthwhile for teachers to select image or video-supported texts and consider how the complimenting materials can be used. Here are a few more examples:
Story: Snake ‘befriends’ snack hamster
(BBC: 19 January 2006)
Clip: Hamster, snake best friends at Tokyo zoo
Story: Much aped chocolate advert scores with public
(Guardian: February 20 2008)
Clip: Cadbury’s gorilla advert
Story: Why the obnoxious guy with the tiny camera makes the news
(Guardian: August 27 2007)
Clip: Traffic cop makes illegal u-turn
Story: Newsreader’s anger over paris story
(Guardian: June 29 2007)
Clip: Mika Brzezinski of MSNBC rips Paris report
Story: Beware of junk food, ‘gross’ ads tell kids
(Guardian: January 16 2008)
Clip: Look at the fat on that!
Story: Free hugs campaign
(Wikipedia)
Clip: Free hugs campaign
Story: Baby buffalo’s escape: the movie
(Guardian: May 18 2008)
Clip: Battle at Kruger
Story: German navy finds new enemy - itself
(Guardian: January 30 2008)
Clip: German navy boats crashing
Story: Guy Goma
(Wikipedia)
Clip: BBC News blunder
Story: City banker behind tube drinking party fears sack
(Guardian: June 2 2008)
Clip: London Underground party May 31 2008
Some ideas for using video-enhanced stories
Images serve both to engage students with a text and also to reinforce their comprehension of it. Here are some ideas:
- Show a video to your students and ask questions about it, elicit relevant vocabulary and language and then move to the text for any reading activity.
- As above but follow up the video with a story telling or dictogloss activity.
- Show a video to your students and get them to investigate the story behing it for homework (i.e. a webquest).