Навчальний проект "Watch TV and Learn English"

Тренінг "Watch TV and Learn English"

Основні навчальні предмети

Практика усного та писемного мовлення.

Вік студентів

1-6 курс. Тренінг розрахований на тих, хто має хоча б базовий рівень знань з англійської мови.

Стислий опис проекту

Тренінг спрямований на покращення та вдосконалення знань з англійської мови. Сьогодні набирають все більшу популярність серіали американського/англійського виробництва, які дивиться весь світ. Різноманітна тематика, візуальне оформлення та автентичість контенту дозволяє не тільки обрати серіал на свій смак, але й використовувати його як допоміжний засіб у вивченні англійської мови.

Оцінювання

Тренінг не передбачає оцінювання у традиційному сенсі. Кожен учасник, обираючи для себе серіал, отримує вказівки, як можна перевіряти свій прогрес та тренувати різні аспекти (граматику, лексику) за допомогою епізодів.

Розробник тренінгу

Інеса Бойко, студентка КДПУ ім. В. Винниченка, ф-т іноземних мов.

Місце проведення

КДПУ ім. В. Винниченка.
16.04.2015.

Watch TV and Learn English. Step 0 - Getting Personal!

Find your English studies boring as death?
Tired of useless words and phrases?
Want to enrich your vocabulary?

If you answered "Yes!" at least on one thing, you're at the right place!

Here at Watch TV and Learn Eng we can help you not only improving you Eng but - what is more important - having FUN!

Stay tuned for more!

Step 1 - Choose a TV Show to Watch!

Consider these before you start:

Pick up a fav genre

There's nothing as bad as watching something you don't like. However, for the start we'd recommend to take the shows with a more 'general stuff' storytelling. And try avoid for the first time too specific shows, loaded with terms. But you'll surely get to that later, we promise!

Make sure the show you've chosen is provided with decent subtitles

It'll be a bit weird at first, reading from the screen, but we promise - it'll do only good for you! What do we mean by decent, you may wonder. Well, try to find subs made by a native speaker or a collab of a native speakers. Such subs will be more accurate.

Don't rush yourself with the episodes - even if the story is really cool and you want more. Take it easy.

Plunging into the TV Shows' world is exciting as well as dangerous. You may find yourself whining over a plot twist, or your fav character's death... Wait a moment, we're talking about studying purposes, aren't we? So, try watching one ep as attentively as you can - make notes of fav words/phrases and the more times you re-watch the ep, try not to look at the subs, but listen. Only when you are 200% sure you got everything, move on! Btw, you can always go back to the previous ep to clarify things!

So what TV series would you get your teeth sunk into?

Step 2 - Watching Episodes with Subs

So, you finally chose a show to watch? And you got decent subs? I mean, decent ENG subs? We'll go back at watching with your native lang subs, but now our task is to watch the series with Eng subs only. 'Gratz, you may press 'Play' in your fav player/gadget and start watching! We'd recommend to have a notebook for interesting words, phrases with you while watching. Don't be discouraged if you don't get something - simply rewind the episode.

Subtitles: Troubleshooting

It happens that subs aren't available for your show. It's not a reason to get sad, but you have two ways: go hard way or go easy way. It will be also more motivating, if you go hard way - your efforts will be paid off with time. See the subs for your fav shows here Subs

Step 3 - Understanding Check

Woo-ho! First ep has been watched! It's time to check how much you've got! And time to practice!

Pronunciation

You may say it's an easy part, but nah, it's not. The best thing you can do now is simply REPEATING. I mean it. Choose your fav couple of sentences or even your fav chara's monologue, have a txt copy of it in front of your eyes and REPEAT after the speaker. REPEAT EVERY WORD LIKE YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON IT. At first you'll be absolutely awful. I'm not talking about transcribing the unknown words, as it may be useful only for those who can read the transcription. Your task at this stage is to UNDERSTAND how the speaker pronounces the word. And, basically, to copy and imitate. For example, my fav monologue is Riario's from Da Vinci's Demons. It starts like "Now that we've established my propensity for directness, I trust our conversation will proceed smoothly."

Vocabulary

Remember, we've talked about the notebook? It's time to use it! You can write sentences with your fav words or even make a story!
Like this one:
A Crammed Story

What you can do to check your vocabulary knowledge?

Find your native language subs and try to translate as many lines as you can in Eng
Disable subs while watching at any moment and write down as many words as you can
Set a number of words you can learn from each ep (+ those which are interesting for you). E.g., Learn 10 words and 20 expressions amd increase the number of what you can learn gradually.

Grammar

Pick up 10 sentences from the episode in Eng and analyze any grammar phenomena you can spot.
Think of a grammar topic you are often confused about. Pick up the sentences from the episode, translate them and pay attention to the phenomenon you are unsure about.

E.g. I had to make an article test once about, based on my fav TV. In case you watch Da Vinci's Demons, you can use it.
Article Test

Step 4 - Post-Episode Check

Understanding Check for the First Episode
Understanding Check for the First Episode - Answers

Step 5 - Revision

Nothing much, only re-watching, re-writing and repeating the stuff!
Practice makes it perfect, they say.
In case you're in need of an extra motivation:

Step 6 - Watching Episodes without Subs

This is what a constant work will get you. You will be able to watch any show without subs and understand almost all.

Step 7 - Tips and Tricks

Most of shows are easily downloaded from torrents.
You may also try using stream services like Hulu.
If you aren't allowed to watch something, download and install the extension Hola.

Resources

Документ для фасилітації Watch TV and Learn English
Стаття до проекту Watch TV and Learn English
Hulu
Hola
Eng subs

Extras

You may also make presentations about your fav show, fav words/phrases.
FavIdioms
Fun Test
FavTVShow
FavCharacterTable