This lesson is designed around Father and Daughter, a 2000 short animated film, made by Michaël Dudok de Wit which won the 2000 Academy Award for Animated Short Film. Students write a narrative, watch a short film, listen to a song and speak.
Language level: Intermediate (B1) – Advanced (B2.2)
Learner type: Teens and adults
Time: 90 minutes
Activity: Watching a short film, listening to a song, speaking and writing
Topic: Fathers and daughters,
Language: Narrative tenses and adjectives to describe emotions
Material: Short film, video and screen shots
Downloadable material: father and daughter lesson instructions father and daughter images father and daughter slides father and daughter lyrics
Step 1
Tell your students that they are going to watch a short film Father and Daughter. Show them the six screen shots in chronological order from the film. Put your students into small groups and ask them to imagine what story the film tells and to write a narrative based on the title of the film and the 6 screen shots. Give them ten minutes to write their narratives.
You can also show the slides using this PowerPoint presentation.
Step 2
Ask one student from each group to read out their narrative and get feedback from the whole class.
Step 3
Show the film and ask your students to compare their narratives with the story told in the film.
Father and Daughter from treip on Vimeo.
Step 4
Ask your students to discuss the film and talk about how it makes them feel.
Step 5
Ask your students to imagine that they are the father in the story. Ask them the following question:
What would you like to say to your daughter?
Give them some time to think, and then put them in pairs and talk about what they would say.
Step 6
Tell your students that they are going to listen to a song called Father and Daughter. The first time they listen they should try to identify any words or phrases the singer uses to express his love for his daughter. Play the video with sound only. Get feedback from the whole class.
Step 7
Give your students the lyrics of the song, and get them to read through them. Play the song a second time and tell them to read the lyrics and listen at the same time. You can also show the lyrics using the Scribd document below.
Step 8
Now show the video with sound and then get feedback from students about the song.
Homework
Give your students the link to watch the film and ask them to watch it again at home. They should write the narrative of the film and a paragraph on what they thought of the film.
I hope you enjoy the lesson.
One of the best responses to a lesson I have ever had. Thanks.
Hi James, thanks a lot for your kind comment. I’m really happy you and your students enjoyed the class.
All the best,
Kieran
Love it, both the film and the lesson plan (OK, partly because I have a daughter of my own
!
Two things kind of worry me: (1) it’s a bit long, as I like to keep any videos I use in class to under 3 minutes; and (2) there’s no listening involved (does there need to be?)
But still, great idea. Can’t wait to try it out in class.
Hi Tom, Thanks a lot for your kind comments, I’m really happy that you like the lesson. I actually chose the film because of the fact it has no dialogue, it makes it much easier to exploit the moving images and students’ visual literacy. In addition, as there’s no dialogue the information overload which normally happens when students watch longer clips or short films doesn’t happen.
All the best,
Kieran
Yes, it’s certainly true about there not being an overload — and it also means that it’s exploitable at lots of different levels of English.
(Perhaps it’s just that my teaching experience goes back to the days of cassettes and I can’t help feeling guilty if we’re not doing “listening comprehension”
. But this is so much more interesting!)
You’ve hit the nail on the head, Tom. If I want to do a listening, I just do audio. Using film with little or no dialogue means that it can be expoited on many different levels. There’s also the element of students getting stressed when’s there’s a lot of dialogue.
Cheers, Kieran
Wonderfull!!! So interesting, I like it so much, very good idea. Could you tell me how can I use movies or short films on reading lessons?
Thanks in advance
Hi Aliya, Thanks a lot for commenting, I’m really glad that you like the site. Here are links to some lessons on reading, but why not use the search box and you’ll find all the lessons on reading?
http://film-english.com/2012/02/19/how-to-be-alone/
http://film-english.com/2012/02/05/the-joy-of-books/
http://film-english.com/2012/01/22/blue-bird/
I hope you find them useful.
All the best,
Kierna
Yes very good. Kieran you look really handsome in your photo
Hi Jessica,
Thanks a lot for commenting. I’m glad you like the site and the photo
All the best,
Kieran
Hi
Thinking of doing this with year 5 (10 yrs olds) – is this too young?
It could be done with young children. Creating the narrative would be a good activity, and I can imagine they could deal with the death of the father. Cheers, Kieran
Yes I agree, but for more advanced learning I do this topic with my year 8 classes as I can talk to them about the film in detail.
Anglea Van-Wilson
Definitely Anglea and Kieran I love your website.
Thank you so much for all the hard work you put into your website. It’s fantastic!
Thanks a lot, Rory. Great to know you enjoy the site. All the best, Kieran
Hi Kieran, I used your 90 minute lesson on my students and they absolutely loved it! I am really glad I found this website as I am currently teaching my year 8 students about the short film ‘Father and Daughter’. I really love this short film. I really appreciate you for putting this lesson up as I found it really useful. I hope you continue to post other English lessons for myself and other teachers around the world to use.
All the best, thanks a lot, from Anna Wedterdans-Bishop High
Hi Anna, I totally agree with you that Kieran’s website is absolutely useful as I used it on my year 9 students in our English lesson. Kieran, please can you continue to post film classes as I would really appreciate it.
from Erin Swan-hiever
Hi Erin,
Thanks very much for taking the time to comment and for your kind words. I’m really glad you like the site so much; I’ll certainly continue to post new lessons
All the best,
Kieran
Hi Anna,
Thanks a lot for taking the time to comment and for your kind words. I’m really happy you like the site so much; I’ll certainly continue to post new lessons
All the best,
Kieran