1)The position and role of this text
“ Body language ” is the third period of unit 21. It’s a reading comprehension text. This lesson is very important for the students to learn in that it is related to our thinking strategies and it uses both words and body language to express our thoughts and opinions and to communicate with other people.
2) Knowledge goal:
Understand the main idea of the text
3) ability goal: ①talk about body language
②improve the students’ ability of reading
4) Moral goal: Get aware of some gestures and facial expressions in different cultures.
5) Teaching aims
①to improve the students’ reading ability, such as skimming, scanning.
②to Understand the main idea of the text
③Get aware of some gestures and facial expressions in different cultures.
Part II. Analysis of the teaching methods
Question-and-answer activity teaching method
Watch-and-listen activity
Free discussion method
Pair work or individual work method
To reach my teaching aims, I’ll take advantage of some teaching aids, such as a tape recorder, multimedia, the blackboard
Part III. Analysis of the learning approach
Interest is the best teacher. But with the heavy study burden and
impact of the traditional spoon-feeding teaching, sometimes the
students may lose the interest in learning and are not independent
enough. So how to motivate them, develop their interest and build up
their self-study ability are the first things I am considering about
PartIV. The teaching process
Step 1 Warming up
Show a short film and a MTV show and ask the students the following questions:
T: How do the actors in the show express themselves?
S: By facial expressions and what they do.
T: What do we call that?
S: Body language.
T: What is body language?
S: Body language is the movements or positions of our body. We use them to show other people what we are thinking about and how we are feeling.
[设计说明] 让学生在课前欣赏两段表演，在活跃气氛，激发学生对身势语的兴趣的同时，通过回答演员们如何表现自己这一问题引出本课话题------body language.
Step 2 Brainstorming
Show some gestures and ask the students to guess what the gestures mean.
[设计说明] 展现几幅身势语图片以激发学生的学习兴趣和参与的热情，创造轻松的课堂氛围，后用一幅图片调动学生的求知欲------同一身势语在不同文化背景下可能会有不同的含义。
Step 3 Reading &comprehension
(1) Listen to the text and answer the following questions:
T: Does body language have the same meaning in different countries?
S: No.
T: What is the best example of universally understood body language?
S: The smile
[设计说明] 在学生预习的基础上，用听力的形式唤起学生对课文内容的回忆，并训练学生通过听获取主要信息的能力，从整体上把握好文章的内容。
(2) Ask students to read the text quickly and find out the main idea/key sentence of each paragraph in pairs.
Para 1: We use both words and body language to express our thoughts and opinions and to communicate with other people.
Para 2: Just like spoken language, body language varies from culture to culture.
(The same gesture has different meanings in different countries.)
Para 3: People in different countries show the same idea in different ways.
Para 4: Some gestures seem to be universal.Para 5: Perhaps the best example of universally understood body language is the smile.
*Teachers can also ask students how many parts we can divide the whole text into and what the main idea of each part is.
Part 1 (Para 1): We use both words and body language to express our thoughts and opinions and to communicate with other people.
Part 2 (Para 2-3): Just like spoken language, body language varies from culture to culture.
Part 3 (Para 4-5): Some gestures seem to be universal.
[设计说明] 阅读课要提高学生提炼文章主旨大意的能力，通过归纳总结一方面从整体上把握文章。另一方面也可提高阅读技能。
(3)Read the passage carefully and try to find out the answers to the following questions:
T: What body language varies greatly?
S: Eye contact, gesture OK, thumbs up, shaking heads, “crazy” gesture, nodding heads.
T: Try to complete the table
S:
GESTURES COUNTRIES MEANINGS
eye contact some countries a way to show that one is interested
other countries rude or disrespectful
a circle with one’s thumb and index finger most countries OK
Japan Money
France Zero
Brazil Rude
Germany
thumbs up the US great or good job
Nigeria Rude
Germany The number one
Japan
moving the index finger in a circle in front of the ear some countries Crazy
Brazil You have a phone call.
T: Some gestures seemed to be universal. What are they? How to communicate them?
S: I’m tired, I’m full, and I’m hungry.
T: Why is the smile the best example of universal body language?
S: ......
[设计说明] 引导学生分析课文，抓住关键词，概括文章的细节，通过填写表格培养学生的理解能力和概括能力，培养和提高阅读能力和技巧。
Step 4 Post-reading
Try to make a comparison between the body language in china and that in the US
Comparison
Meaning Gestures in the USA Gestures in China
No, don’t do that.
Moving the index finger from side to side. Moving the head or hand from side to side
I don’t know Shrugging one’s shoulders Shaking the head
Well done Thumbs up. Thumbs up.
Incredible. I can’t believe it.
Rolling one’s eyes.
open one’s eyes and mouth wide
Money Rubbing the thumb and forefinger together Rubbing the thumb and forefinger together
Crazy
Moving the index finger in a circle in front of the ear. No such a gesture
Good luck
Cross the fingers on both hands No such a gesture
Come here
Moving the index finger forwards and backwards. Moving one’s hand up and down with the palm facing down.
[设计说明] 本部分通过表格形式培养学生分析比较研究能力，从而更好的掌握不同文化背景下身势语的异同，达到本节课的教学目的，同时也提高学生的跨文化交流意识。
Step 5 Discussion/Assessment
Imagine you are the boss of the company and you want to employ a man as your assistant. Judging from the body language of the four men, which one will you choose? Why?
[设计说明] 培养学生运用所学知识，围绕中心话题进行思考和讨论的能力，提高学生英语口头表达的技能;准备好四张卡片，让四位学生上台用身势语将卡片上内容表现出来。让其他学生作出选择，并解释选择的原因。通过这种方式一方面可以让学生学会用身势语表达自己。另一方面锻炼了口语。
Step 6 Dumb show
Think of some situations in your daily life in which you use body language and then try to act them out without any words. You can work in pairs or groups.
[设计说明] 学生以小组形式开展活动，讨论真实语境下的身势语的表达，通过这一话题，一方面激活了学生的思维，活跃了课堂气氛，另一方面也让学生学会了观察生活，从而学会生活;同时在表演结束后再让其他学生用英语描述表演者所表现的情景，培养观察身势语的能力，并在想象，猜测的过程中形成内心语言，终用语言复述自己的思想。
Step 7 德育渗透
Do in Rome as Rome does [as the Romans do].
[谚]入国问禁, 入乡随俗。
Manners make the man.
礼貌造就人。
Good manners are the art of making those people easy with whom we converse. ---Jonathan Swift
礼貌周到是使同我们谈话的那些人感到自在的艺术。
——(英作家)斯威夫特
Step 7 Homework
1. Read the passage and try to recite it.
2. Finish Word study on Page 60.
3. Try to know more about body language.
