人教版高 中英语 SEFC 2B UNIT 19 Unit 19 The Merchant of Venice 四川省大邑县安仁中学 蒋中志

Teaching aims and demands: 1. Skill Goals: ① Talk about Shakespeare and his plays; ② Learn to recount detail in conversation; ③ Review Direct and Indirect Speech; ④ Write a short play. 2. Ability goals: Enable the students to be the real volunteers in class while the teacher acts as the director or conductor and help the students learn how to talk about Shakespeare and his plays, telling apart the characters and their relationship, including analyzing their personalities and enjoying the play.

Learn something about Shakespeare’s works, especially his writing styles and diction at that time. By reading and enjoying the very play, the students will have a deep understanding of the time of Shakespeare, a pioneer during the period of Renaissance. 4. Learning ability goals: How to get the students to enjoy the play and tell apart the leading roles as well as their relationships. Enable them to talk of Shakespeare and his plays, do with the grammar mentioned in this unit, meanwhile, analyze the characters in it to write a short story.

Teaching difficult points: 1. Pair work or individual work to make the students work effectively in class; 2. How to help the students to master direct or indirect speeches better; 3. How to improve the students’ reading abilities; 4. How to get them to talk of Shakespeare and his plays and analyze the characters; 5. How to create certain situations to practice useful expressions and act the play out.

Teaching important points: 1. Improve the students’ listening and speaking abilities; 2. How to improve the students’ reading abilities; 3. How to enjoy English plays and recount details; 4. Arouse the students’ interests of tasting some works about dramas. Teaching methods: 1. Listening and answering activities to improve the students’ listening ability; 2. Pair work or individual work to make the students work in class; 3. Fast-reading to get the general idea in this play; 4. Careful reading to help the students understand some detailed information; Discussion to let the students know something about this play.

Learning methods: Individual, pair or group work, listening, reading, discussing, writing, cooperative learning and thinking. Time arrangement ： Period 1: Warming up and Speaking Period 2: Listening Period 3 : Reading( Ⅰ ) Period 4 : Reading( Ⅱ ) Period 5: Integrating skills and grammar Teaching resources and aids: A tape, a tape-recorder, a computer, multi-media, a projector, some slide shows, a copy of this film “The merchant of Venice”.

The first period (Warming up and speaking) Step 1. Greetings Greet the whole class as usual and check the previous exercises. Step 2. Lead- in There was a great British playwright and poet in the world’s history of literature. He wrote about 37 plays,154 sonnets, 2 narrative poems and a large number of poems in life. Here is a portrait of him. Do you know who he is?( show the picture on the screen). If possible, the teacher will give a brief introduction about Shakespeare to the students, including his backgrounds, plays and the periods of his times. At the same time, the teacher has to list some representatives about each period, such as comedy, tragedy and historical plays.

Comedy: All’s well that ends well, As you like it, The comedy of Errors, Cymbeline, Love’s labors is lost, Measure for measure, The merchant of Venice, A midsummer night’s dream, Much ado about nothing, Pericles, prince of tyre, The tempest, Troilus and Cressida, Twelfth night, The winter’s tale. Tragedy: Anthony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, Hamlet, Julius Caesar, King Lear, Macbeth, Othello, Romeo and Juliet, Timon of Athens. Historical plays: King John, Richard Ⅱ, Richard Ⅲ, Henry Ⅵ and so on. Poems: The sonnets, A lover’s complaint,The rape of Lucrece, Funeral elegy by w.s.

Step 3 warming up This part is a cool beginning for the students to be led in this hot topic. The teacher gets them to read the following quotations from Shakespeare’s different plays and ask them to find out the answers from which plays they come? What do you think these famous words mean? ① No. 1 comes from Hamlet and its meaning is being terribly upset and undecided, is it possible or not? Is he alive or not? ② No.2 comes from King Henry Ⅳ and its meaning is that a person who has a great responsibility, such as a king, is constantly worried and therefore doesn’t sleep soundly. Namely, the life of leaders is not easy. Having many responsibilities, leaders often cannot sleep very well. ③ No.3 comes from Hamlet. It means that it’s best not to lend money to other people and not to borrow from other people. So, be careful to take or give money to others, you had better be careful. ④ No. 4 comes from Romeo and Juliet and its meaning is why my lover Romeo is from a family that has a long feud ( 世仇，不和 ) with mine. If only you had a different name, we would not have this problem. ⑤ No. 5 comes from Troilus &Cressida and its meaning is empty words, not real thoughts or ideas from the heart. It is all empty words and there is not any truth in them, you just only talk, but you don’t mean it. Which plays of Shakespeare do you know? Which plays of Shakespeare do you know? Can you explain what they are about? After that, the teacher will have the students talk of some familiar plays written by Shakespeare. The teacher will give some famous sentences and phrases from his plays on the blackboard, which are popular nowadays. The teacher will have to give their explanations to them. 1. Every inch a King, 2. breathe life into a stone, 3. For goodness’ sake, 4. All the world is a stage. 5. A dish fit for the gods, 6. Good riddance. 7. A pound of flesh, 8. It seems to heaven. 9. My salad days, 10. what is done is done.

Step 4. speaking What makes a play a masterpiece is that the ideas behind the play are about problems which are still important to people of different ages in modern times. We can find several such ideas in Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice. Work in groups of four or five. Find examples for each situation in modern life and discuss whether it is right or wrong. The teacher will divide the class into some groups, each of which will have a discussion about Mercy versus Revenge, Love versus Money. When time permits, the groups will debate or state their ideas, using the useful expressions in this part. Step 5 summary After practice, the teacher will sum up some key words and phrases in the two parts. Meanwhile, get them to collect as much information as they can about Shakespeare. Step 6 Assignment Preview the play “The merchant of Venice” and recite some new words learnt in this period.

The Second Period (Listening) Step 1 Revision Check the homework and greet the students as usual. Step 2 Presentation The teacher will get them to turn to page 66 and know of the main tasks to be done in this period. The teacher asks them to look at part 2, listen to the tape and answer the following questions, further knowing some detailed information about the play, esp. the characters and their relations. This part is a fine preface for the students to understand it better. Step 3 listening Before listening to this material, the teacher shall explain some key words and troublesome plots to them. Necessarily, they will listen to it for some times. On finishing it, the teacher will check their answers.

Step 4 listening After doing with the listening material, the students also know Antonio, Duke, Bassanio, Portia, Shylock better and their personalities, which helps them enjoy the play well. Then the teacher asks them to look at the exercise on page 137, another piece of listening material. This is about Portia’ story. Three men will marry her, each of whom will choose one of the three boxes. Every box will contain some a text, an object and a short note. Whoever chooses the box with her portrait will marry Portia. This game is cruel invented by her father, of course which I think is interesting. The teacher may give some extra information to them to increase their interest.

Step 5 Listening deeply All the students will listen to the materials for several times and check answers. Write some key information down and fill in the blanks, what are the three boxes made of? What key words are written on each box? Who will marry Portia in the end? What contains in every box and what does it mean to us? Just then, the teacher has to take this opportunity to discuss some deep truths about life----All that glitters is not gold. Step 6 Homework Review all they have learnt and preview the play to prepare to write a short essay expressing comment on it.

The third period ( Reading) Step1. Greeting Greet the whole class as usual and get some of them to tell their opinions of this play in a way. Step2.Lead-in Ask students to retell the main characters of the Merchant of Venice and their relationships according to the listening parts and the screen. Step 2 Pre-reading First the teacher with the students will do with the pre –reading exercise in the form of getting answers from them. 1. What are the names of the three most important characters in this play? 2. What do you think Portia will do to save Antonio? Talk about the picture to arouse the students’ interest in reading the play.

Step 3 while-reading Given some minutes, the students analyze the characters after looking through the play, finding out some details and explaining the deeper meaning of some puns and symbols. Read the passage again and fill in the blanks on the screen. Answer some questions on the screen 1.What is your opinion of Portia? 2.What is your opinion of Shylock? 3.Why do you think Shylock prefers to take his pound of flesh instead of the money from Bassanio? 4.What are the two meanings of “I’ll pay him back with all my heart? 5.A classical balance is often used as a symbol for The merchant of Venice. (1).What is usually weighed with a balance? What goes into the scales left and right? (2).Why does Portia ask Shylock whether he brought a balance? (3).What is the deeper meaning of the balance? What is weighed in Portia’s court of law? When the students finish doing with questions, the teacher will give the possible keys on the blackboard.

Step 5 Explanation Deal with some language points if possible: 1. You might as well go stand upon the beach and argue with the sea. 2. If you offered me six times what you have just offered, I would still take my pound of flesh. 1. Shylock, how can you hope for mercy for yourself when you show me none? 2. It’s useless trying to argue with Shylock. 3. Mercy falls like the gentle rain from the sky upon the earth. 4. I have sworn to heaven to have my pound of flesh, I must have it. 5. I will pay him back with all my heart. 6. let me take you in my arms. Step 6 Homework Deeply understand the five characters in this play and preview the next part to know its ending.

The Fourth period (Reading ) Step 1 Greeting Greet the students as normal, checking how much they preview the ending. Step 2 Revision The teacher will have a revision about the play, expecting the students to know what is going on. At the same time, get some of them to analyze their characters and relationships and know the way they enjoy English play, such as settings, plots, conflict, climax, outcome or ending. Step 3 Reading All the students will have a look at the rest of this play to get the result of this play. Step 4 Grammar Do with some difficult language points in this part.

Step 5 Performance If time permits, the teacher will make the most of time to get them to act it out. Maybe it is not convenient to do so, one condition is that they will prepare for it beforehand. Step 6 Homework Remember the key points of this unit and learn to write a short essay giving some opinions of English plays or drama. All the students will prepare to retell this play in the next period.

The fifth period (Integrating skills and grammar) Step 1 Greetings Greet the whole class as usual and get some of them to retell the play. Of course, the teacher also asks some of the students to analyze the leading roles including their characters. Step 2. Revision All the students will have a revision about what we learned in the previous class.

Step 3 Reading Listen to the tape to get the general idea. Read the whole passage and answer some questions. 1.How does Portia stop Shylock from cutting Antonio’s flesh? 2.What does Portia say when Shylock finally agrees to take three times more than Antonio borrowed from him? 3.What is the result of the trial? Does the story have a happy ending? 4.What is your opinion of the Duke in this play? 1. What can you learn from the play?

Step 4 Discussion The teacher will give some related questions to have a discussion. By taking advantage of the exercises in the language study, all the students have to change the underlined sentences into a dialogue. This part is to make them practice the switching of direct and indirect speeches. Step 5 Explanation 1. at the mercy of 2. go down on one’s knees 3. beg for Step 6 Summary After learning this unit, the teacher will conclude what is learnt and the most important language points. All the students will learn to retell this play and know more about the great playwright Shakespeare. Step 7 Homework Finish off the exercises in the students’ workbook and check the answers in the next period.