Lesson
Topic: Tea traditions around the world
Equipment: whiteboard, computer, coursebook, PPT presentation, pictures, Internet materials (pictures, video, audio)
Objectives: get the students acquainted with some new information on the topic
check their reading comprehension of the home read text
develop the students' skills of understanding the audio and video materials
get the students speak on the topic, use their knowledge of the world, share their opinions
upbring their tolerant and respectful attitude to the traditions of other cultures and foster love to their country
Warm-up:
Do you like tea? (slides 1-5)
First, I would like to know what words do you think about when someone say “tea”, what are your associations with the word TEA?
Students' answers.
Now have a look at the associations of some people I asked.
Hot, tasty, lemon, herbal tea, green, leaf, spoon, traditions, cup, talk, Indian, China, England, granny, family, saucer, sugar, sweets.
Are they different? Can you add them to your associations? OK, and will you, please, try and group the mentioned words into 3 or 4 groups and give them names. You can work in two groups.
Very well, as the students know, and as the guests have already understood, we are going to talk about tea today. That's the topic of the lesson: tea history, traditions and ceremonies.
So, why do you like tea?
Students answers.
Thank you. I'll ask now my students to come up to the guests here and ask them some questions.
Gathering results.
How many people answered that they like green tea?
How many lovers of black tea are we having here today?
How do the majority take their tea? – sugar/honey
– no sugar
– lemon
Many thanks to everybody.
Look, please at the chart I have made according to the students and their family preferences.
So, tea around the world. When do we usually drink tea?
Sts' answers.
People may drink tea at any time in different social situations. It maybe part of an afternoon tea party served in elegant China cups and saucers with sandwiches and cakes. But tea is jut as popular drunk from large mugs as a morning or afternoon cuppa tea at work.
Listen, please, what is tea for the British (video clip) beginning
The tea-drinking traditions of what countries are described in the text?
Which other countries are mentioned?
In this slide (slide 6) you can see a so-called cloud made up of the opinion of he British about tea. Can you read out what is here?
I. CHECKING LISTENING COMPREHENSION.
Let's proceed to some listening activity. (slides 7-8)
Everyone will have a sheet with a task. It’s a usual kind of work for you. You are having the gapped text. Please, listen carefully to the recording and fill in the gaps.
According to legend, 5,000 years ago, the Chinese Emperor, Shen Nung, ordered everyone in China to 1)_____ water to avoid disease. One day, he was going to drink some water, when some – 2)_____ from a tree fell into it. Shen Nung tried the brown liquid and found it extremely 3)______. That was the start of tea.
By the 9th century AD, tea had spread to Japan, where it became terribly popular with – 4)____ monks. In the – 5)______century, 'tea mania' arrived in Europe and then America. It even provoked a war between America and Britain. In – 6) ______, a group of Americans, incredibly angry about taxes on their tea, threw boxes of tea into Boston harbour!
Nowadays, tea is a common drink in many countries. China, India and Kenya are the largest tea producers and the Japanese still take part in the rather long and complicated tea – 7) ______. In Russia, people drink slightly sweet tea with lemon and some people still use traditional samovars for the hot water. The British are pretty keen tea 8) ______, too. Nowadays, 'afternoon tea' with cakes and 9) ______is much less common but many Brits drink several 10)______of milky tea every day.
Boil, leaves, refreshing, Buddhist, 17th, 1773, ceremony, drinkers, sandwiches, mugs.
Checking (slide 8)
II. CHECKING READING COMPREHENSION. (slides 8-10)
1) Reading for specific information.
Please look at this slide and you can see the questions for you to answer.
(slide 9). You will see the numbers and dates and you should decide what things from the text they refer to.
Dates and numbers
1610 – tea was brought to Europe by the Dutch
4 o'clock – low tea
$100 – the price of a pound of tea in the Netherlands in the 17th century
Between 5 to 6 – the time of high tea
5,000 – years ago tea appeared in China
1904 – iced tea was invented
80 % – of tea in the USA is iced
2) Remembering details. Matching exercise.
You have a set of sentence beginnings and the second part of the sentenses. So you need to match the beginning with the ending. Please, work in pairs or in trios. Try to finish the task in 5 minutes and we'll check together.
(slide 10)
1. The history of tea goes back 5,000 years ago.
2. Tea was brought to Japan by a Buddhist monk.
3. From China tea was brought to Europe in 1610.
4. Soon it replaced beer as a national drink.
5. Tea houses were the centre of Chinese social life.
6. The Japanese tea ceremony contains four principles of Zen.
7. The British tea holds a high place in daily life.
8. The British usually drink black tea with milk.
9. One of Queen Victoria’s ladies started a new custom.
10. High tea is served around 5 or 6 o’clock.
11. Low tea consists of light cakes and thin sandwiches.
12. Americans drank coffee instead of tea, associated with Britain.
Now there are some slides to remind you about the Japanese ceremony. (slides 11-13)
Let's remember some details about the ceremony.
· Where the ceremony is performed?
· What is special about the door to the tea house? Why?
· What are the 4 principles of Zen Buddhism which the ceremony contains?
· What does the winding path to the house symbolize?
III. SPEAKING
Now time has come to speak about tea-drinking traditions in Britain.
Tea is traditionally the most popular drink in Britain and is usually drunk with milk and sometimes sugar. Remind me please, when tea became popular in Britain? (between 1652 and 1654). Who was the “author” of the 5o'clock tea tradition? (the Duchess of Bedford 19th century)
video excerpts (slides 14-17)
What kinds of tea can you name? Students’ answers.
Builders’ tea. Have you ever heard of builders’ tea? (slides 18-19)
Do you remember the chart about tea preferences of you and your families? Very similar to Russian traditions.
Let’s look at the slide once again (slide 20) The majority of people drink black tea with sugar
(slide 21) What do you know about tea drinking in Russia?
The main feature of the Russian tea-drinking - its long duration - is closely connected with samovar as it allows to keep up almost indefinitely the water temperature necessary for preparing tea. For this reason drinking tea with samovar could last for hours filling free time of those who did not have to work or being one of the main types of family entertainment for lower classes. Russians did not want to refuse their traditional tea even while travelling, till our days there have been preserved "road" samovars of rectangular form that are easier to pack in the luggage.
At the same time tea was not a self-sufficient drink. Most frequently a samovar on the table was neighbouring with a glass of jam or honey and various baked goods.
Usually tea was drunk with sugar - tea was sipped through a lump of sugar held in the mouth. Partly this was caused by the fact that sugar in Russia was an even more expensive colonial product.
Strong and aromatic tea invariably appears on the table finishing a family dinner or supper. At the same time tea by itself can become a cause for a meeting of old friends. Russians often invite "for a cup of tea" and given the long tradition of tea drinking that has made of Russians true tea connoisseurs, more often than not it is a cup of really good tea.
Let’s compare our small company traditions of tea-drinking with British traditions. If you look at the chart (slide 22) you can notice that British have their tea nearly always with sugar and milk.
(slide 23) While watching the next episode I would like to pay your attention to one of tea utensils which everyone has at their home. Try to figure out what it is and its name.
(slide 24) Get acquainted with 'caddy'.
· caddy a small box, can, or chest in which tea is kept for daily use
(slide 25) a cloud of the words which British associate with tea things, utensils, teaware.
Let’s have some relaxing play-time. (Optional)
Guessing game. Describing things
(slide 26) Look, please at the page with tea equipment. I'll ask you now to try and describe the teaware which is in the picture. Some of you will try to understand what piece of equipment the other person is talking about.
IV. LANGUAGE STUDY. WATCHING AND LISTENING
(slide 29) idioms with 'tea'
It's not my cup of tea.
Not for all tea in China
.. as good as chocolate tea pot
V. Evaluating, setting the HA
Reflection
What new things have you learnt
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