Yay for finally having something I deem worthy of putting up again! This is a lesson I did with my advanced class, but I also dared to give it to one of the medium-levels, and they managed to do an alright job of it too.
Write on the board: ETIQUETTE and ask What does it mean? (surprisingly, both classes answered "manners". I didn't expect anyone to know) So then I clarified "rules: how to be POLITE." And then as a class we brainstorm some examples. I kick things off by saying "Add yo at the end of a sentence." And then they'll get going (with a little candy incentive) on please and thankyou and bowing, etc.
Now announce you have a short video.
Go to youtube.com and search "Urinal Etiquette". The first result is the one you want to show. It's fast-talking, but the visuals are straight-forward enough that that's okay.
After write "BATHROOM ETIQUETTE" on the board and ask "what did you learn?" ("don't use #5" they might say...or they might say "nothing") Whatever, The point is just to get them brainstorming bathroom Etiquette...you can use this time to preach about washing your hands if you so desire (but I tend to side with the 'why should I wash my hands? I didn't PEE on them!' point of view
), or if they're smarter, ask about the Etiquette bell, farting, and talking to the person at the urinal next to you.
After, I pulled a student up to the front of the class, and positioned him to look like he was peeing on the side of my desk. and I announce "This boy is peeing at the urinal!" (they laugh, cos it's goofy-looking) and then tell the story about how sometimes I see his friend (and point to myself) come over and HUG him (so I hug him from behind)...AT THE URINAL! and I put my head on the boy's shoulder. The class errupts with laughter because, of course they've all done it at least once, and I say "OMG! WHY!? FAUT-PAS!" and then teach that that word and how it means literally "MUST NOT DO!". And so we brainstorm Faux-pas of the bathroom
It's so funny to hear what they come up with "don't kick, don't push, don't see". (encourage some acting in their explaination. What they mean by 'don't kick'...is that they sometimes kick the backs of peeing students knees so they stumble and pee all over the the place/themselves)
Now break them into groups and have them draw "Etiquette" and "Faut-Pas" half-and-half columns on their page and brainstorm as a group. Every group is given a different scenario... I have
-On the bus
-While eating
-At a friend's house
-On a date
-In the classroom
After, each group presents.
I seem to have just 5 minutes floating around at the end of every single one of my classes. If you have this same problem, you can further youtube search for "Good Idea - Bad Idea" (remember that skit from Animaniacs?). It's sorta relevant to the theme, and there's a 2-minute compilation that you can stretch out by pausing it for a moment after each one b/c it goes faster than their brains work in English.
I know Virginia is reading this now and saying "That's a LOT of material!" but I'm an ADD teacher and need to move on with things
After they have 8 - 10 ideas written down, I tend to think they got the point.
