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**Olympics Lesson Plan - Choice Lesson Plan 2**
**Rational:** One of our main objectives is to help the students understand why it is important to study French. We chose the topic of the Olympics for two reasons: 1. The Olympics are coming up this summer (maximizing learning opportunities) 2. It ties in well with the vocabulary of the unit. 1. Make connections with current Olympics in Beijing. Talk about the Olympic council: ask students what language they think the Olympic council might speak (keeping in mind that the council is made of of representatives from many countries, and speak different languages). Guide the students to an understanding of the importance of the French language today (explanation that French is the language of the Olympics). Ask students why they think French was established as the official language. //7 minutes// 2. Talk about Francophone countries that have hosted the Olympics (spotlight on Grenoble and Vancouver). Show students where these cities/providences are located and ask students if they think the summer or winter Olympics were held there. Show a powerpoint highlighting the two Olympic events. //10 minutes// 3. Play a clip of an authentic radio announcement of the Olympic games in Beijing. The announcement will be entirely in French and it will be 5-6 minutes long. We will be listening to the clip 3 times: The first time the students will listen without any worksheet. After the clip finished playing once through, we will ask if they picked up on any vocabulary, verbs, or main ideas in the clip. //5-6 minutes// 4. The second time the students listen to the clip, they will be given a transcription worksheet where vocabulary words and other familiar words are blanked out. They will have to pay attention and listen so they can fill in the missing words. We will go over this as a class and see if everyone was able to fill in the answers. //12 minutes// 5. Before listening to the clip a third time, we will have students see if they can figure out what the announcement is about. Students will work in groups of 2-3: they will circle any cognates they notice on the transcription, and other familiar words, and any verbs they recognize. Once students have finished doing this, we will come back together as a class and see what familiar words all of the groups have found. We will have a transparency of the transcription on an overhead and have one student from each group come up and circle the words they found. Then, as a class, we will discuss what the article is about by focusing on the words the students know. We will work together until the general idea of the article is understood by the students. We will also provide the translation of a few difficult words to help the students understand the main idea of the text better. //20 minutes// 6. Once the students understand the main ideas of the announcement, we will listen to the clip a third time. We will instruct the students to listen to the radio clip, with the full transcription in front of them. They are required to follow along (the focus will be on meaning this time, not form). At the end, we will see what other ideas they were able to understand. //7 minutes//
 * Level of Learners:** high school, 1st year
 * Brief Description:** This is an activity that focuses on the Olympics (particularly the upcoming Olympics in Beijing and past Olympics that were help in France or Francophone countries. The reason we chose to create a lesson about the Olympics is because they are coming up shortly so students can relate to it, also most of the vocabulary words are related to sports, so they can practice their vocabularyduring a cultural discussion and a listening activity. Also, we want students to understand why it is important to learn French so we are going to explain to students that French is the official language of the Olympic council.
 * Objectives:** After this lesson, students will understand the importance of the French language in the global community. In particular, they should become aware that French is the official language of the Olympic council. Students will engage in a cultural discussion and be expected to correctly implement their unit vocabulary in this authentic context.
 * Standards:**
 * 1.1.M.SL.g:** Exchange information in the target language about personal and social, community or current events.
 * 1.1.N.SL.g:** Ask questions about the attributes of places and things in their immediate environment
 * 1.2.N.L.d:** Understand main idea of an audio presentation (CD, lecture, radio, podcast, songs/music)
 * 2.1.N.H.e:** Identify and describe how the language and culture expanded throughout the world
 * 4.1.N.a:** Identify basic differences and similarities in vocabulary between one's own language and the target language (cognates and borrowed words)
 * Materials:** Internet connections for online radio broadcasting. Worksheets with transcription.
 * Procedure:**
 * Due to technical difficulties, we are not able to load the audio clip or transcription, however, many clips are available at www.olympic.org.