Stuck where some genius has decided that low-frequency vocabulary such as “pen” and “taking notes” is important? Have you been ordered to ensure that students have “proficiency” in listing things they Absolutely Need For School?
Stress no more: the easy story script for this is here. This was developed with the help of Nicole Kunkel and Donna Yakubowski, and taken for a spin with French 2s in 2015. Yes, we used prsent, passe compose and imparfait when we asked it. Feel free to steal this. I’ll type it in English. If we have Spanish, French etc teachers, maybe you guys could write it up in those languages and post it in the comments. Students must be familiar with the Super 7 verbs.
This is an outline: the fun is in the details and what you end up with hopefully won’t look exactly like this.
MATERIALS
— a backpack with some random weird non-school stuff in it
— a student actor to be a student
— another actor to be the teacher
WORDS WE ARE TEACHING
— got annoyed/was annoyed
— had forgotten (yes, this is the pluperfect tense)
— “Have you forgotten/did you forget _____?” — “Yes, I have forgotten/forgot ___.”
— arrived late
— some words for school materials and/or classes
SCRIPT (blanks, and words in italics are variables– let the class develop these)
There was a boy named Mandeep. He was _____,had _____, was from ____, wanted _____ (develop character).
One day, Mandeep arrived at school late. He went to his _____ class. When he arrived, the teacher Mr Smith was/got annoyed.
T: Mandeep! You are late to ____ class. I am annoyed!
S: Sorry for being late.
T: Mandeep! Why are you late?
S: Sorry sir, I was ______. (develop)
T: Mandeep! Do you have your (school item)?
[actor looks in his backpack and pulls out a (ridiculous non-school item)]
S: Sorry, I don’t have my ______.
Mandeep had forgotten his _____!
T: Did you forget/have you forgotten your _____?
S: Sorry sir, I forgot/have forgotten my _____. (you could develop this)
[We repeat this a few times. We can also add other teachers, classes and rooms. We can also use ourselves as the/one teacher, but it is super-fun to have a student imitate us.]
The next day, Mandeep arrived on time in class. But there was a problem: Mr Smith was not in class. He was late! [actor sits behind teacher’s desk] Mr Smith arrived late.
S: Mr Smith, you are late!
T: Yes I am late. Sorry.
S: Where were you?
T: I was in ______ (develop)
S: Mr Smith, do you have a (school item)?
T: No, I have forgotten/forgot ____
Mandeep was/got annoyed, because Mr Smith had forgotten his ______.
WRITTEN VERSION
For this, we have a student write up what happened in class, and we can add a twist ending, eg student sends teacher to office to see principal, principal forgets things, etc.
t.p.r.s. q&a 