高中人教版 (新课标)Unit 3 Life in the future教案

Period 3　Listening and Speaking

The General Idea of This Period

This is the third period of this unit.At the beginning of this period, the teacher should design some exercises to review what the students learned in the last period.The second period centers on the understanding of the passage First Impression.The teacher can begin with asking some questions or having a competition to make some sentences with“first impressions”according to the passage.

This period mainly deals with listening and speaking.At the beginning, teachers focus on training the Ss’ listening.This listening content is about living in“Wonderworld”and a new kind of quilt, which Xiao Feng has invented.It can “think” for itself and become warmer or cooler according to the weather.

When training the Ss’ listening ability, teachers should start with pre-listening, that is lead-in.If it is necessary, teachers had better introduce some background knowledge about the listening material.After that, ask the students to predict what the following listening material may be about according to the given information.Teaching students to listen in a proper way is the aim of this activity.A good listener should be able to predict according to some hints such as the topic, the questions listed, etc., to listen with the purpose of finding useful information and to summarize.Later, let the Ss listen to it.At the same time, teachers should design some simple questions.After that, the Ss have known some about the listening material, and then teachers can ask them to listen to it again to be ready for more difficult questions.If necessary, the Ss can be given another time to listen.While practicing, teachers had better give students some advice on how to do it well.Certainly, suppose there are many new words and expressions, teachers deal with them firstly.

After practicing listening, the Ss are expected to learn some expressions about imagination. The topic is about what life will be like what life will be like in your hometown in 1000 years’ time.Later let the students work in pairs.Imagine you are two inventors and you have designed a new product, which you want to sell.First, you need to decide on your product.It can be anything that people might find useful in the future.It might save them time, make work easier or help in communication.Second, you will have to explain to the class exactly how your product works.It can use any branch of science.Third, you need to show that people will be willing to use it.

During the course, teachers should rank class activities from the easy to the difficult.First, ask them to learn the expressions.Then, ask them to imitate it to have a dialogue.Finally, the students are expected to create a dialogue or discuss the given topic, using the expressions about imagination.

This period lays emphasis on speaking and listening.The teacher should try his or her best to encourage the students to say something.Don’t always correct the mistakes that the students would make while speaking.Otherwise, the students would feel reluctant to speak out their opinions.

Teaching Important Points

Train the students’ speaking ability by describing, talking and discussion.

Help the students improve their listening ability.

Teaching Difficulties

 Train the students’ listening ability.Especially listen and understand the key words and understand the speakers’ intention and attitude.

Teaching Aids

a tape recorder, a projector, the blackboard

Three Dimensional Teaching Aims

Knowledge Aims

Let the Ss know about some wonderful imagination.

Get the Ss to learn how to express imagination.

Ability Aims

Train the students’ speaking ability by describing, talking and discussion.

Train the students’ listening ability.

Develop the students’ imagination ability.

Emotional Aims

Train the students’ ability to cooperate with others.

Develop the students’ imagination ability.

Teaching Procedure

Step 1 Greeting

T: Hello, boys and girls.

Ss: Hello, Miss Wang.

Step 2 Revision

T: Today we will begin our lesson with a competition between groups.In the last period, we learnt about an e-mail written by Li Qiang.Now, please say something that you know about it.If you offer a complete sentence, you will be given ten marks.Your group will be given twenty marks when your expression is especially beautiful.

S: Li Qiang paid a visit to the future in AD3005.

S: He felt very nervous at first, but he felt much better after eating green tablets.

S: He arrived on the earth in one thousand years by capsule.

Ss: ...

(The teacher should encourage more students to join in the competition.At the end of the competition, the teacher should announce the result of this competition.Praise the winner and encourage the losers.)

Step 3 Listening(on Page 23)

Task 1 Pre-listening

T: Let’s read the following phrases together.

space creatures, living on another planet, new discoveries in space, why a space station spins, how to get water on Mars, comets, houses in a town on Mars, Martian creatures, atmosphere and gravity

T: Can you understand those phrases?Please predict what you are going to listen may be about according to the phrases.

Ss: It may be about life on the other planet.

Task 2 First Listening

T: Now let’s listen to the tape to see whether what you predict is right or not.At the same time, you are asked to tick the things that you hear on the tape?Do Exercise One on Page 23.

(After listening, let them check the answers.)

Task 3 Second Listening

T: This time.You’d write down the answers to the four questions.Boys and girls, how can we write the answers fast and correctly?

S: We should go through the questions first and keep them in mind.When we are listening, we just need to pay much attention to the sentences related to the answers.

S: We needn’t write down each word of the answers.We just write down some key words. Later we can write down the complete answers with the help of these key words.

T: You are clever.Now please get ready.First, look through the introduction to the listening material.Then, scan the questions.

(Two minutes later, the teacher plays the tape.Then give Ss time to organize their sentences.)

T: Let’s check the answers one by one.

(If students make some common mistakes or they seem to have difficulty in finding out answers, teachers can give them some hints and let them listen to it again.After that, check the answers.If the students feel it difficult to make sense about the key words and understand the speakers’ intention and attitude, the teacher should give them some help.)

Task 4 Post-listening

T: After listening, would you please answer some questions?

1.What did you hear on the tape?

2.Do you think people in the future will be able to live in“Wonderworld”?Why do you think so?

(At this part the teacher may have the students present what they have heard on the tape and show their own opinion on living in“Wonderworld”.If possible, the teacher may have some of the students do the presentation work in class.By doing this, the students can get full understanding of what the tape is talking about.)

Step 4 Post-listening(on Page 55)

Task 1 Pre-reading

T: Now let’s learn about a magic quilt.Xiao Feng has invented this new kind of quilt.It can“think”for itself and become warmer or cooler according to the weather.Let’s read the following words and phrases on Page 55.Try to pronounce them correctly.

Task 2 First Listening

T: Now, let’s listen to the tape and tick the things you hear on the tape.

(Later ask the students to check the answers.)

Task 3 Second Listening

T: Just now we have listened to it and know some advantages of this special quilt.Suppose you are marketing manager in the company that makes the quilts.So you have been asked to find areas in the world to sell the quilt.Listen to the tape again and think of the places where the quilt will work best.You will be asked to finish Exercise Two.It will work best in __________ winters and__________ summers.

(After listening, let the students check the answers.)

Task 4 Post-listening

T: You did a very good job just now.Let’s go on to fill in the form.Use your atlas if you need more information.Add two other places you think will be the right places to sell the quilt.

(If the students have some difficulty, let them listen to the tape a third time.Then give them about three minutes to consider and discuss with their partners.Finally check the answers and exchange their opinion.)

Step 5 Speaking

Task 1 Lead-in

T: Boys and girls, are you sure what will happen to you tomorrow?

S: No.No one knows what will happen tomorrow.

T: I agree with you.When we express what will happen, what expressions do we often use?

S: Is it possible that...?

S: Suppose that...

T: Good.We often use them to express our imagination.Besides those, we also use the following: 

 I wonder if...Do you imagine that...?I wonder if...Is it likely/unlikely that...?

 Do you suppose that...?Perhaps/Maybe/Possibly...Mostly likely...Probably...

Task 2 Practice

T: Now please use these expressions to list some questions about what life will be like in your hometown in 1000 years’ time.Then exchange your questions with your partner.After that, get together with another pair and answer their questions and ask them your questions.Four students make up a group.By asking and answering, you four choose the best questions and answers.Finally each group will choose a representative to give a talk to the class.

Task 3 Talking

T: Now let’s work in pairs.Imagine you are two inventors and you have designed a new product, which you want to sell.First, you need to decide on your product.It can be anything that people might find useful in the future.It might save them time, make people’s work easier or help in communication.Second, you will have to explain to the class exactly how your product works.It can use any branch of science.Third, you need to show that people will be willing to use it.These descriptions of some imaginary products may help you.

1.These“flying boots”are operated by a small computer chip.They will rise straight up from the ground and hover or move quickly forwards or backwards.Press the switch in your hand once to start and twice to stop.

2.Another time-saving invention.This is a shirt that cleans itself as you wear it.Heat from your body warms the shirt and it attracts water vapor from the air.When there is enough water the shirt releases chemical, which cleans itself as you wear it.

3.Never pay for electricity again!This light bulb absorbs light from the sun and stores it.When you turn it on at night, the light is released so the bulb gives off“free”light.

(As usual, the teacher won’t forget to give comments on what the students do, including the teacher’s words praising what they are doing in the first few stages.Only in this way are the students encouraged to talk freely about what they want to say and why they think so.) 

Step 6 Summary

T: In this period, we mainly focus on the speaking and listening abilities.If you feel listening or speaking poor, you had better practice more.Practice makes perfect.After class, would you please do so?Today’s homework is to invent what you want to own in the future.Then prepare for description of how it will work and what advantages of using it.

The Design of the Writing on the Blackboard

Unit 3 Life in the future

Period 3 Listening and Speaking

Research and Activities

Read the following material about Mars, and then write a passage about whether people in the future will be able to live on the Mars.In the passage, you will be asked to present your opinion and try to persuade others to believe in your imagination.

Basic atmospheric data

The Martian atmosphere is composed mainly of carbon dioxide (CO2).It is very thin (less than 1 percent of the Earth’s atmospheric pressure).Evidence suggests that the atmosphere was much denser in the remote past and that water was once much more abundant at the surface.Only small amounts of water are found in the lower atmosphere today, occasionally forming thin ice clouds at high altitudes and, in several localities, morning ice fogs.Nitrogen, oxygen, carbon monoxide, and the rare gases (neon, argon, krypton, and xenon) also are present in small quantities.

The characteristic temperature in the lower atmosphere is about 200 K, which is generally colder than the average daytime surface temperature (250 K).It decreases upward from the surface at about 1.5 K per vertical kilometer.

Unlike that of the Earth, the total mass (and pressure) of the atmosphere experiences large seasonal variations, as carbon dioxide“snows out”at the winter pole.The annual variation of surface pressure was measured to be about 26 percent of the mean atmospheric pressure (7-8 millibars) at the lander sites, equivalent to some 7.9×1012 metric tons of carbon dioxide.Although the Martian atmosphere is thin, it supports a variety of clouds.White clouds are water ice, while the“yellow”ones are dust storms that throw dust into the atmosphere to heights of 10 km (6 miles) or more.Even in the absence of storms, the atmosphere is never clear of dust, which greatly affects atmospheric structure.

Reference for Teaching

Exploring the planet Mars

People on Earth have always been interested in the planet Mars.Recently, that interest has increased because several successful spacecraft have been placed in orbit around Mars.These include the American space agency’s Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey and the European Space Agency’s Mars Express.

Perhaps the most exciting event took place on January third.That is when the first of two Mars exploration vehicles successfully landed on the Red Planet.The first lander is named“Spirit”.It came to rest in an area of Mars named Gusev Crater.Millions of people used their computers to link with NASA’s Internet Web site to see photographs sent back by Spirit.

On January fifteenth, NASA scientists told Spirit to use its six wheels to move off the landing device.It did this successfully and rolled on to the surface of Mars.Excited NASA officials said Spirit was now ready to begin its task of exploring the surface of the Red Planet.

On January twentieth, scientists told the exploration rover to use one of its tools to study the soil near the rock.The next day, Spirit began having problems.It answered radio signals, but it would not send back scientific information.

NASA officials began to work to correct the problem with Spirit’s computer.The part of the computer that stores information was not working correctly.On February 1st, NASA announced that Spirit’s computer memory had been successfully repaired.It will begin scientific examinations of rocks later this week.

The second vehicle is named“Opportunity”.It landed in an area of Mars called Meridiani Planum.NASA scientists say Opportunity landed inside a large hole in the surface of the planet.Photographs from Opportunity show several large formations of rock.The photographs clearly show this rock is below the surface.NASA scientists say the rock they see in the photographs is not like anything they have ever seen before.

NASA officials say they have discovered and confirmed that Opportunity landed on an area of Mars that is rich in the mineral crystalline hematite.On Earth such hematite usually forms in the presence of water.Scientists want to know if the hematite on Mars was formed under water too.

Some evidence suggests that long ago the Meridiani Planum area of Mars was wet and held water.Opportunity will search for more evidence of water and any evidence that some kind of life could have existed in the area.

When they get to an interesting area they reach out with a mechanical arm that carries several tools.The arm carries the microscope, two instruments for identifying what the rock is made of and a tool for cutting into the rock.

Scientists say that Spirit and Opportunity will explore the surface of Mars for as long as ninety days.The rovers will be exploring the surface in an effort to find evidence of water on Mars.Water is extremely important to any future human exploration of Mars.

The two devices are trying to discover if we have not been alone in the universe.They are trying to answer the question: Is there any evidence that life once existed on the Red Planet?

UN calls for greater efforts to protect environment

U.N.Secretary General Kofi Annan said that the theme of this year’s World Environment Day is Connect with the World Wide Web of Life, “a choice that reflects the need for every one of us to recognize our role in preserving our fragile planet and the ecosystems, resources and natural process that bind us all together.”

“More than ever, life on Earth requires of us a sense of universal responsibility—nation to nation, person to person, human to all other forms of life, ”he said.

Klaus Toepfer, executive director of the U.N.Environment Program, said that the riches of the information age are being felt by everyone on earth, however, the world’s old problems are enduring and urgent, citing the looming threats of inequalities brought about by the forces of globalization, poverty, reduced food security, the intricate balance between population, resources and the environment, the challenge of sustainable development and the relationship of all these to the future of humanity and the environment.

“The theme of this year’s World Environment Day is a reminder that the earth with all its complex, interlocking ecosystems, is the foundation of our lives.It is our common heritage.The bounty of nature is one and indivisible.It knows no frontiers, no territorial borders, ”he said.He noted that human beings are a part of a vast web of interconnected species and systems that fit together in intricate ways, enabling the whole system to continue.

“There are limits to how much our population can grow, and how much we can alter our surrounding environment, without causing changes that will reverberate throughout that web and jeopardize our own future, ”he said.

He called on governments and people worldwide to join hands and take common steps to protect environment so as to pass a safe, clean world to human’s offspring.