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John Wayne on Superstition
A scene from the film "Circus World"

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[Time on Video CD: 9:13-13:21]

The scene opens in the middle of a circus Wild West show with cowboys, horses, and a stagecoach. A young female circus performer named Tony is standing on top of three horses riding them around the circus ring. As she rides she sees a bird flying around at the top of the circus tent. Distracted, she makes a mistake and falls off the stagecoach to the ground. People run to her to find out if she's all right. Matt (John Wayne) comes to take her back to her trailer and along the way they get into a heated discussion about superstition.

Part 1: An Accident

Part 2: Superstitions, make-believe, and raising a child right.

Part 3: Proof

Information

[Note: For a list of superstitions that might form the basis for additional role-play situations see "Conversational Inspirations for ESL" (Zelman, 77-78)]
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A lesson plan to use when the video isn't available

If the video of the movie isn't available or if the movie dialogue just seems too difficult to use with your students, you can have them read the movie script instead. This is basically what the "story roleplay" format in Ladousse (1987) is about. The following lesson plan is based on that format. (Please note that "Preparation" is put at the end because it has already been done for you. See the handouts in the index above.)

Movie derived roleplays without the video

Students read one scene from a movie script and role-play the characters.
Level
Advanced
Time
30 minutes
Aim
Use a scene from an interesting movie as the basis for a combined reading and role-play activity in which students are given the opportunity to experiment with the language in the movie script.
In-brief
Students warm up by categorizing words from the script. After the warm-up they read the script, write answers to comprehension questions, and roleplay situations based on the movie scene. During the roleplay one student in each group is selected as a "movie director" to guide the other students in acting out the role-play, providing them with vocabulary and suggesting how they should respond and act. Finally, the teacher selects a few groups to act out their roleplay in front of the class.
Language
The language functions, topics, and vocabulary found in the movie scene should be noted down and categorized by the teacher. (Note: This has already been done for this activity.)
Organization
Pairs or small groups.
Preparation
Already prepared. See the worksheets:
Procedure
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Preparation
  1. Select a scene from a movie and make a transcript of it.
  2. Determine the language functions found in the scene.
  3. Use ideas in the scene to create similar situations for role-play.
  4. Write down several words and phrases that are important for conveying meaning in the scene. You can also write down pairs of phrases spoken by two people such as "A: Are you all right? B: It's nothing, really."
  5. Write these words and phrases down on the handout in a random order. (Note: A variation on this is to write the words down in full sentences taken perhaps from a corpus-based dictionary like Collins Cobuild or Cambridge International.)
  6. "Sort the the words and phrases into broad semantic categories such as PERSON, PLACE, and EVENT." (Little, 1997, 229) For example:

    Heard words evokes SCHEMA
    make-believe, seeing things, no sense to it, unreal, crazy head, It's all bunkum. UNREAL
    prove it, it doesn't count. PROOF
    slipped, dangerous, careless, afraid of, scared of, hurt, Are you all right? ACCIDENTS
    omens, superstitions, hexes, voodoo, bust a mirror, make good things happen, rabbit's foot, horse hair in your handkerchief, owl feathers, a bird in the tent, a milk white butterfly SUPERSTITION
    father, raised, family discussion FAMILY
    tent, perform, horses, cowboy hat, Wild West show, trailer CIRCUS
    (Based on: Rost, "Listening in Language Learning" (1990), p. 72)

  7. On the handout list the categories referred to above horizontally as column headings with blank columns underneath for students to categorize and list the words in.
  8. Write down 3 to 5 comprehension questions for the scene on the handout. The following categories from Rost (1991) might be helpful: "(1) Setting: what is the setting? where does this conversation probably take place? (2) Characters: who are the speakers? what is the relationship between the speakers? (3) Purpose: what is the purpose of the conversation? what does A want B to do? (4) Attitude: what is A's attitude towards B? what is A's reaction to B?" (111)
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