Families: Jobs in family names

Objective & content

This Look Closer episode (People and characters mini-series, episode 41) is a one-and-a-half-minute documentary about English family names that were once jobs, told with real photos, old paintings and a page from a parish register of 1580. A single narrator greets Mr Smith and Mrs Baker, then explains that long ago in England most people had only one name, like John or Mary, and that families later got a second name, a family name, which was very often a job. Five jobs follow, each with its picture: the blacksmith, who makes things with metal and fire (Smith), the baker (Baker), the tailor (Taylor), the cooper, who makes big wooden barrels (Cooper), and the man who catches fish (Fisher). Five famous people share these names: Maggie Smith, Josephine Baker, Roger Taylor, Bradley Cooper and Carrie Fisher. Today Mr Smith isn't a blacksmith and Mrs Baker doesn't make bread, but their names tell a story about their families. The present simple carries the episode (makes, catches), with the past simple for long ago (had, got, was), this man and this woman to point at a picture, the possessives his, her and their, and the negatives isn't and doesn't, with vocabulary for jobs and the family. Learners listen, then answer the 10 questions in the app: 7 on facts and 3 on vocabulary (blacksmith, tailor, cooper). The study topic is fictional and real families.

Materials & prerequisites

The folder holds the audio, the slideshow and the script. Each pack is a one-page PDF with the text, three photos, 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 (And you? Is your family name a job too?) for a short class round: learners look up the meaning of their own family name, or of a French one such as Boulanger or Lefèvre (an old French word for a smith), and say My family name is ... It's a job or It isn't a job. Learners should know name, family, bread and clothes, and be able to say what someone does with the present simple (He makes bread). Blacksmith, baker, tailor, cooper and fisher name the subject of the episode, so they are taught for understanding here, above the A1 word lists.

Curriculum alignment

Tagged people-and-characters (6e, "Personnes et personnages", study topic "Familles fictives et réelles", Cycle 3). The episode targets CEFR level A1+.