On Broadway: Hit musicals

Objective & content

This Look Closer episode (Broadway mini-series, episode 112) is a one-minute documentary about three hit musicals, told with real photos of Broadway, old book pictures and drawings. A single narrator explains that a musical is a show with a story, songs and dancing, then presents The Phantom of the Opera, on Broadway for thirty-five years, The Lion King, whose animals are actors with big puppets, and Wicked, the story of the two witches from The Wizard of Oz. Learners meet the present simple to describe a show (is about, tells the story, they stay), the negative don't (the actors don't only speak), the past simple (was, stayed, started, made) with No other show ..., and a closing Which musical would you like to see? question. The vocabulary is about shows and music, animals and witches. Learners listen, then answer the 10 questions in the app: 9 on facts and 1 on vocabulary (musical).

Materials & prerequisites

You need the episode (audio and slideshow) and the printables: a one-page pupil pack and 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 present simple with it and they and the numbers up to fifty. Musical and hit name the subject, so they are taught for understanding; musical is explained in the episode, mask, puppet and witch are shown in the pictures, and the show titles stay in English.

Curriculum alignment

Tagged art-and-expression-of-feelings (6e, "Arts et expression des sentiments", study topic "Welcome to Broadway", Cycle 3). The episode targets CEFR level A1+.