The Tower of London: The Beefeaters

Objective & content

This Look Closer episode (Tower of London mini-series, episode 181) is a one-minute documentary about the Beefeaters, told with real photos and drawings. A single narrator explains that their real name is Yeoman Warders and describes their two uniforms (red and gold on special days, dark blue and red on other days), then looks closer: every Beefeater was a soldier for twenty-two years or more, and they live inside the Tower with their families. The episode ends with the Ceremony of the Keys, when a Beefeater locks the Tower's big gates just before ten o'clock every night, and a closing Would you like to see the Ceremony of the Keys? question. Learners meet the present simple for routines and facts (they wear, they live, a Beefeater locks, it happens every night), was for the past (every Beefeater was a soldier before), these and their, and the questions of the ceremony (Who comes there?, Whose Keys?). The vocabulary is about jobs, clothes, colours, family, sightseeing and the time. Learners listen, then answer the 10 questions in the app: 7 on facts and 3 on vocabulary (lock, Halt!, show visitors around).

Materials & prerequisites

You need the episode (audio and slideshow) and the printables: a pupil pack and a teacher pack (the text, three pictures, the key words and the 10 questions, with the answers highlighted in the teacher pack), a pupil question sheet and a teacher answer key. There is no lesson plan. Learners should know the colours, the numbers and how to say the time (ten o'clock). Beefeater, Yeoman Warder and ceremony name the subject, so they are taught for understanding; guard is shown on the opening photo, and lock, Halt! and show visitors around are shown in the photos and drawings.

Curriculum alignment

Tagged countries-and-landscapes (6e, "Pays et paysages", study topic "The Tower of London", Cycle 3). The episode targets CEFR level A1+.