General notes

Our materials are meant to provide communicative practice in the English language classroom. Our method is best used on a daily basis as students get immersed in the language used in films and profit from this regular exposure.

However, there may be circumstances that do not allow teachers to have frequent access to video equipment, and so a film has to be viewed at a single sitting. Nevertheless, the activities in the e-books will still prove successful since the situations in films are so powerful that they can still generate a special atmosphere when referring back to them later on.

• Procedure for daily viewing

The exercises provided follow the development of the movie. Teachers should stop the video as indicated in the notes and follow the 4 steps described below:

1)    Watch and enjoy the chunk (unless there is a pre-viewing exercise).

2)    Have students concentrate on the exercise provided. Make sure they understand it clearly before they have their first go at it.

3)    Proceed as indicated in the notes.

4)    Watch the scene again and discuss the exercise.

Note Although not all parts of the video are worked on, we would like to highlight the importance of viewing the whole film.

• Procedure for single viewing

This procedure is advisable for those teachers who have no access to video equipment on a daily basis.

1)    Students view the film at a single sitting.

2)    In the lessons to follow, teachers should get students to do the activities provided, ignoring the listening activities.

3)    When teachers can have access to video equipment again, they should only play those parts marked as listening activities. The specific references to when a scene begins and ends will help teachers find the parts easily.

Note  The success of this method greatly depends on the teacher’s ability to help students see video viewing as another tool for learning and not just as a form of entertainment.

Practical considerations

• All our e-Books are in PDF format. If you encounter problems when downloading our materials, it probably means you need to install the Acrobat Reader programme, which is available free of charge on our website.

• The activities in the worksheets are NOT traditional comprehension questions/ true-false exercises that merely check listening comprehension. Instead, there is a wide variety of communicative activities specially devised to raise language awareness as well as developing reading, writing and speaking skills (see our free samples).

• Provision has been made for both pair work and group work so the activities can be used with either small or large groups.

• When choosing the materials for a certain class, you must always bear in mind that the levels the films have been worked at are meant for students who have already achieved or are about to achieve that level (i.e. if a group is just beginning intermediate level it is advisable to choose materials at pre-intermediate level.

• The teacher’s notes provide step-by-step guidelines, describing where scenes begin and end, the aim of each activity, a suggested procedure and suggested answers (even in the case of freer activities)

• The table of contents includes the topics of the film, the linguistic aspects developed, as well as the grammar and lexical items practised in that particular film.