At the ticket office

Objective & content

This is a short everyday conversation, about one minute long, to listen to and then answer: Sam, 12, and his gran buy two tickets from a ticket clerk (a man), with a price, train times, a platform and directions to catch. The script is not shown in the app: pupils only listen, and a picture of an empty ticket office shows during the opening sound, then fades. The language is the language of a ticket office: would like as a set phrase ("We'd like two tickets to York."), can for requests (Can I pay by card?), questions such as What time is the next train?, there is for what is available, and imperatives for directions (go up the stairs, turn left), with the words single, return, adult, platform, stairs, late, same, price and trip. In the app, pupils answer 18 questions: listening (gist, then detail), words and useful phrases. The script is for the teacher, as a transcript for an optional follow-up in class.

Pedagogical guide

The episode is made for pupils to do on their own: in class on a tablet or in the computer room, or at home. Each pupil listens with headphones, as many times as they need, and answers the 18 questions in order. The listening questions come first, gist then detail, so the first listen is for the general idea (who is there, where Sam and his gran want to go and what the problem is) and the next ones are for the details (the price, the train times, the platform and the way to it). Pupils pause and replay the audio themselves; the picture fades so they listen instead of looking. There is no script and no translation on screen: a pupil who doesn't know a word looks it up in a dictionary. The teacher's part is short: set the task, look at the results, and, if there is time, run the short follow-up in class below. The lesson plan gives a whole-class version for a teacher who prefers to play the episode to the class.

Suggested procedure

For the pupil (about 15 minutes):

1. Listen once, without stopping, for the general idea: who is there, where Sam and his gran want to go and what the problem is.
2. Answer the first listening questions.
3. Listen again, and pause when you need to. On a piece of paper, write down the price, the train times, the platform and the way to it.
4. Answer the detail questions, then the words and the useful phrases.
5. For each wrong answer, listen to that part again and find what you missed.

Back in class (optional, about 10 minutes):

1. Look at the questions most pupils got wrong, and play those lines again together.
2. Hand out the script as a transcript: pupils find the line for each answer.
3. Role-play: in threes, buy tickets to a new town, with a new price and time.

Materials & prerequisites

• The episode in the app (the audio, the scene picture and the 18 questions), on one device per pupil, with headphones.
• A piece of paper for notes.
• For the follow-up in class only: the script, printed as a transcript, one copy per group of three.
• Prerequisites: numbers, prices and times in English.