GETTING TO KNOW STEVEN SPIELBERG

Teaching aims:

1. To help students have a good understanding of the text.

2. To improve students’ reading and speaking abilities.

3. To study the lesson to know about famous director Steven Spielberg.

Key points:

1. To get students to know some information about Steven Spielberg.

2. To get students to say something about Steven Spielberg by their own words.

Difficult points:

To ask students to have an interview between a famous person and a journalist.

Teaching procedures:

Step 1 ------ Leading in

1. Show some posters of movies directed by Steven Spielberg.

2. Let students know that Steven Spielberg is a famous director in the world.

Step 2 ------ Extensive reading

1. Ask students to read the text as quickly as possible and do following exercise.

What’s main idea of the text?

A. His childhood and his family

B. His hobbies and his films

C. His career and his films

D. His career and his marriage

2. Ask students to read the text with the tape and do T or F exercise.

(1) Spielberg started making cartoon films when he was still a young boy. (F)

(2) He made his first real film in which Spielberg used a lot of toys.(F)

(3) The reason why he couldn’t go to the Film Academy was he couldn’t afford it. (F)

(4) His short film won him a job as the youngest film director in the world. (T)

(5) Jaws, ET and Jurassic Park are his highly successful films. (T)

(6) Though Spielberg is one of the top directors in the film industry, yet he has few fans in China. (F)

(7) He married an actress and the couple has seven children in all. (T)

Step 3 ------ Intensive reading

1. Ask student to get the meaning of following words in the text (words catching).

(1) He wrote the scripts for the films himself. (Para. 1)

scripts ------ a written form of a speech, play or broadcast

(2) This was the moment when Spielberg’s career took off. (Para. 2)

took off ------ become successful

(3) Jaws (1975), one of his first films, was a real blockbuster. (Par. 3)

blockbuster ------ a film produced with a large amount of money

(4) Spielberg has made two films about creatures that come to the earth from the outer space. (Para. 4)

creatures ------ a living thing

(5) After these highly successful films Spielberg made several follow-ups of Jaws and Jurassic Park. (Para. 5)

follow-up ------ a film or book that comes after another with the same story or actors.

2. Ask students to read the passage aloud and find what they do not understand.

Step 4 ------ Summary

1. Ask students to divide the text into three parts.

Part 1 (Para.1-2) the development of his career

Part 2 (Para.3-6) some introductions of his films

Part 3 (Para.7) the success of his success

2. Ask students to work in group of four and fill the form about Steven Spielberg.

Name: Steven Spielberg Year of birth: 1946

Place of birth: a small town in America Career: director, producer and screenwriter

Family members Father Engineer

Mother Music teacher

Wife Actress

Youth period At the age of 12 Made his first real film

At the age of 13 Won a prize for a short film

At the age of 16 Made a film called “Firelight”

Brief introduction of his movies Jaws(1975) A big white shark that attack swimmers who are spending their holidays in a small village by the sea.

ET(1982) A young boy called Elliot who makes friends with a small creature from outer space and helps him to find a way to go home.

Jurassic Park (1993) A park where a very rich man keeps different kinds of dinosaurs. When the park is hit by a storm, things started going wrong.

Schindler’s List (1993) Cruelty of war

Saving Private Ryan (1998) Cruelty of war

Step 5 ------ Activity

A speaking task for practicing the text according to the given situation.

Work in pairs. Suppose one pf you is Steven Spielberg and the other is a journalist of a newspaper. Steven is being interviewed by the journalist. The journalist asks some questions about his career, his film, his secret of his success. The journalist is also interested in his opinions about Chinese film and his future plan.

The Beginning ------

J: I’m very happy to have the chance to interview you, Mr. Spielberg. May I ask you some questions?

S: Of course.

J: Could you tell me when you made your first film?

…

Homework ------

Self-evaluation ------