221B Baker Street

Objective & content

This Look Closer episode (the second episode of the mini-series Sherlock Holmes's London) is a short documentary about Baker Street, a long street in London. A single narrator explains that in 1887 a writer, Arthur Conan Doyle, gave his new detective, Sherlock Holmes, an address there: 221B Baker Street. The narrator then looks closely at the numbers: in 1887 the houses in Baker Street did not go up to 221, so 221B did not exist. Many readers believed that Sherlock Holmes was a real person, and they sent him letters. In the 1930s the street became longer and number 221 was now a bank, so the letters arrived at the bank, and the bank paid a secretary to answer them; often the answer was the same: Mr Holmes does not work any more, and he keeps bees in the countryside. Today there is a Sherlock Holmes museum in Baker Street, with a sign that says 221B, and people still write to Sherlock. It is a comprehension episode: the narration uses the past simple and the present simple, with longer, and no grammar point is taught. Learners listen, then answer the 10 questions in the app: 7 on facts and 3 on vocabulary (detective, address, did not exist). The study topic is Sherlock Holmes's London, the real places and people behind an imaginary detective: here, an address that did not exist.

Materials & prerequisites

The folder holds the audio, the slideshow and the script. Each pack is a one-page PDF with the text, three pictures, the key words and the 10 questions: a pupil pack, and a teacher pack with the answers highlighted. It also has a pupil sheet and a teacher sheet with the answer key. It has no lesson plan. Play the episode twice, hand out the pupil pack, then use the closing question (What would you like to ask Sherlock Holmes?) for a short class discussion. Learners should know the words house, number, write and answer, and be able to read years such as 1887. The pack's key words explain the new words (address, exist, secretary, bee, countryside).

Curriculum alignment

Tagged reality-and-imagination (5e, "Le réel et l'imaginaire", Cycle 4). The episode targets CEFR level A2-.