Humanising Language Teaching
Year 1; Issue 3; May 1999
INTERPRETING DIALOGUES
from the work of Alan Maley and Alan Duff
| Level: | N/A |
| Time: | N/A |
| Purpose: | Stimulate a variety of student abilities |
| Preparation: | N/A |
Lesson outline:
In their book Variations on a Theme, CUP, 1978, Duff and Maley offer taped snippets of dialogue and ask the students to discuss who the people are and what is really going on. This is a marvellously natural exercise that you, dear reader, must have done many times as you eavesdropped snatches of conversation on planes, buses and trains.
What follows is a squeeze of dialogue from P.146 of their book, followed by the interpretation questions they propose:
A: What d'you think?
B: Sounds interesting. You've done it before, have you?
A: No, s'the first time.
B: Really? Don't you think you're taking a risk?
A: Maybe... Are you against it?
B: Well, let's say I'm not entirely in favour of it.
Interpretation:
Where is the conversation taking place?
Try to work out exactly who the people in each of the dialogues are.
Close your eyes and try to imagine their
- voices
- bodies
- posture
- faces
- age
- attitudes to one another.
What exactly does one of them intend to do which the other disapproves of.
(Cambridge University Press let this classic of EFL lapse into out-of-printness in l993. Sic transeunt gloriae mundi cum pecuniam non ferrunt (so do the glories of the world pass when they do not bring in money).
