Canada: Canada Day

Objective & content

This Look Closer episode (the summer episode of the mini-series Canada through the seasons) is a short documentary about Canada Day, the national holiday on the first of July. A single narrator starts in Ottawa, the capital, explains that the day is the birthday of the country, born in 1867 when three British colonies joined together, and shows how people celebrate: red and white clothes, a maple leaf painted on the face, planes and fireworks. The narrator then looks closely at the flag: learners count the eleven points of the maple leaf and hear why the first design, with thirteen, was changed before Canada chose the flag in 1965. It is a comprehension episode: the narration uses the present simple and the past simple (with was and were), there are and the imperatives look and count, and no grammar point is taught. Learners listen, then answer the 10 questions in the app: 7 on facts and 3 on vocabulary (joined together, points, celebrate).

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 is the capital of Canada?) to check the first line, and ask pupils how their own country celebrates its national day. Learners should know the colours, the words city, river, face and flag, and be able to read years such as 1867 and dates such as the first of July. The pack's key words explain the new words (capital, colony, join together, maple leaf, fireworks, point).

Curriculum alignment

Tagged daily-life-places-rhythms-seasons (5e, "Le quotidien : lieux, rythmes, saisons", Cycle 4). The episode targets CEFR level A2-.